“Everybody wants to know
Why I sing the blues
Yes, I say everybody wanna know
Why I sing the blues
Well, I’ve been around a long time
I really have paid my dues…”
This song is one of BB King’s classics, and it purports to answer the question why BB sings the blues. We’ve spent a lot of time here at GMR explaining what the blues are and recommending new blues CDs, but you have to wonder sometimes what it is that causes someone to spend a lifetime singing the blues. Don’t you? Here are three new CDs by blues artists from the US and Canada who might answer the question in their own way, but who each have been around a long time, and definitely have paid some dues.
“When I first got the blues
They brought me over on a ship
Men were standing over me
And a lot more with a whip…”
Carlos del Junco is the youngest of the three, but he has a shipload of accomplishments. Seven-time winner of the Canadian Maple Blues Award’s Harmonica Player of the year (that’s seven times in 11 years!); Two gold medals in 1993’s Hohner World Harmonica Championship (diatonic blues and diatonic jazz); Blues Musician of the Year Award from Jazz Report Magazine in 1996; a Juno nomination, and more. Plus, he makes absolutely stunning albums. When he whips out that harmonica, the cat can blow. Charlie Musselwhite (no slouch himself) says this about Carlos, “Really outstanding. Carlos del Junco is happening.”
Steady Movin’ is where the latest happening takes place. From the opening groove, just setting the tempo, to the first time Carlos blows past the reeds in his diatonic Hohner, you know you’re in for something special. Man, this cat is good. The band’s not so bad either. Kevin Breit on guitar, Jorn Juul Andersen on drums, Marc Rogers on basses, keyboardist Denis Keldie and Matt Brubeck adding cello. Oh, and John Dickie sings on “Mashed Potatoes Canada.”
After getting everyone moving with “Diddle It,” Carlos starts track two off slowly, then it turns into a pseudo-James Bond theme and then after some Breit guitarwork it takes another turn. Whew! It’s not blues, but it’s not bad. “Jersey Bounce” was a hit for Benny Goodman back in 1942. It didn’t sound like this, though. “Mashed Potatoes Canada” is next with John Dickie from the Mississippi Hippies shoutin’ the blues. Carlos covers his favourite Sonny Boy Williamson tune with “Movin’ Down the River Rhine” and that tune combined with an amazing “Amazing Grace” provide a real workshop for playing the diatonic harp.
(Northern Blues, 2008)
“I’ve laid in a ghetto flat
Cold and numb
I heard the rats tell the bedbugs
To give the roaches some…”
Jimmy Thackery has been around for more than 30 years. He’s played with Muddy Waters and others. Touring blues hotspots will find you in roach motels and rat-infested clubs. So he knows what he’s talking about. He’s a guitar player. He sings too, but his voice is limited and gruff, emotional enough for the blues but not potent like Muddy or the Wolf. It’s on the Stratocaster where he shines. He knows his way around the fretboard. One minute wringing moans from the Strat, the next racing up and down the neck with precision. His album rocks, rolls and even takes a bow towards surf music with the track “Landlocked.” He wrote it in tribute to a friend “… a buddy in Appalachia with a surf band called Landlocked … named after the band so they could use it as their theme song.”
“Just a Feeling” is a rocker, as is Thackery’s cover of Chuck Berry’s “Promised Land.” “(You Got Me) Now What You Gonna Do?” is a Chet Atkin’s style instrumental shwocasing another part of Thackery’s guitar prowess. None of the songs are pure blues, but the soul of the blues echoes throughout. Jimmy is backed up by bassist Mark “Bumpy Rhodes” Baumgarner and drummer Mark Stutso, and the three of them make a lot of noise. All of it good.
(Heads Up, 2008)
“Yeah, they told me everything
Would be better out in the country
Everything was fine
I caught me a bus uptown, baby
And every people, all the people
Got the same trouble as mine.”
In 2008 Taj Mahal is celebrating his 40th year in the music business. Country blues, city blues, Caribbean blues, Hawaiian blues, uptown or downtown, he’s done it all. Maestro is his first US release in five years, and celebrates his career in style. Guests include Ben Harper, Jack Johnson, Angelique Kidjo, Los Lobos, Ziggy Marley and others. That guest list should give you an idea of the eclectic nature of Taj’s music.
The set starts off with Taj’s tribute to Otis Redding, “Scratch My Back.” Otis did this one back in the ’60s, when Mahal and Ry Cooder’s band The Rising Sons were opening for Redding at LA’s Whiskey A-Go-Go. “Never Let You Go” finds Mahal playing a ukulele and leading Los Lobos! Starts slow and then goes into a reggae groove. Los Lobos playing reggae, go figure! This is followed by Ben Harper joining Taj on “Dust Me Down” a funky shouter. Great harmonica solo by Taj. “Further On Down the Road” is one that Mahal co-wrote with guitarist Jesse Ed Davis, back in the day. This new version is one of four tracks cut with the Phantom Blues Band, and guest vocals from Jack Johnson. Ziggy Marley and his band take on “Black Man, Brown Man” revisiting Jamaica authentically; Rudy Costa adds sax. Africa is next as Angelique Kidjo and Toumani Diabaté join for “Zanzibar.” There’s more Los Lobos, a couple of tunes with the New Orleans Social Club (including Fats Domino’s “Hello Josephine”) and more.
You’d think from the descriptions that maybe this album was all over the map, and geographically that’s true. But the songs are held together by the strength of Taj Mahal’s personality and his professionalism. You don’t survive in the world of blues (or any music for that matter) without talent and vision. He’s loaded with both.
(Heads Up, 2008)
