A Man And The Blues

The guitarist's first album away from Chess - and to be truthful, it sounds as though it could have been cut at 2120 S. Michigan, with Guy's deliciously understated guitar work and a tight combo anchored by three saxes and pianist Otis Spann laying down tough grooves on the vicious "Mary Had a Little Lamb," "I Can't Quit the Blues," and an exultant cover of Mercy Dee's "One Room Country Shack."

The band's wildly energetic and seriously soulful CD Jump Start is jam-packed with Lil' Ed's incendiary slide playing and rough, passionate singing, as the ragged-but-right Blues Imperials cook like mad alongside him. It is a tour-de-force of untamed slide guitar, rock solid rhythms, heartrending ballads and authentic deep blues vocals. Williams wrote or co-wrote 13 of the album's 14 songs, ranging from the non-stop boogie blast of "If You Were Mine" to the heart-on-his-sleeve honesty of "Life Is A Journey" to the bouncing and jazzy "Jump Right In" to the swaggering, autobiographical "Musical Mechanical Electrical Man." The album overflows with the band s full throttle drive and is fueled by Lil' Ed's love of both serious blues and good time fun.

The band's wildly energetic and seriously soulful CD Jump Start is jam-packed with Lil' Ed's incendiary slide playing and rough, passionate singing, as the ragged-but-right Blues Imperials cook like mad alongside him. It is a tour-de-force of untamed slide guitar, rock solid rhythms, heartrending ballads and authentic deep blues vocals. Williams wrote or co-wrote 13 of the album's 14 songs, ranging from the non-stop boogie blast of "If You Were Mine" to the heart-on-his-sleeve honesty of "Life Is A Journey" to the bouncing and jazzy "Jump Right In" to the swaggering, autobiographical "Musical Mechanical Electrical Man." The album overflows with the band s full throttle drive and is fueled by Lil' Ed's love of both serious blues and good time fun.

Slide guitarist Lil' Ed Williams & the Blues Imperials bring the energy of live performance to their seventh Alligator release, Full Tilt. The highlights on this disc tend to reflect that of the album's title, especially the spirited cover versions of the Contours' "First I Look at the Purse" and Hound Dog Taylor's "Take Five," along with the originals "Hold That Train," "Candy Sweet," and "My Baby Moves Me." Lil' Ed's raucous guitar chops are at center stage on those tracks and the additional backing from horn players Eddie McKinley and David Basinger and pianist/organist Johnny Iguana add some extra kick. There are a few lukewarm tracks that are a bit too rote and, unfortunately, bring down the overall good-time party appeal of this disc. Still, fans of Lil' Ed & the Blues Imperials, or electric modern blues in general, will want to add this to their collections.

Slide guitarist Lil' Ed Williams & the Blues Imperials bring the energy of live performance to their seventh Alligator release, Full Tilt. The highlights on this disc tend to reflect that of the album's title, especially the spirited cover versions of the Contours' "First I Look at the Purse" and Hound Dog Taylor's "Take Five," along with the originals "Hold That Train," "Candy Sweet," and "My Baby Moves Me." Lil' Ed's raucous guitar chops are at center stage on those tracks and the additional backing from horn players Eddie McKinley and David Basinger and pianist/organist Johnny Iguana add some extra kick. There are a few lukewarm tracks that are a bit too rote and, unfortunately, bring down the overall good-time party appeal of this disc. Still, fans of Lil' Ed & the Blues Imperials, or electric modern blues in general, will want to add this to their collections.

Slide guitarist Lil' Ed Williams & the Blues Imperials bring the energy of live performance to their seventh Alligator release, Full Tilt. The highlights on this disc tend to reflect that of the album's title, especially the spirited cover versions of the Contours' "First I Look at the Purse" and Hound Dog Taylor's "Take Five," along with the originals "Hold That Train," "Candy Sweet," and "My Baby Moves Me." Lil' Ed's raucous guitar chops are at center stage on those tracks and the additional backing from horn players Eddie McKinley and David Basinger and pianist/organist Johnny Iguana add some extra kick. There are a few lukewarm tracks that are a bit too rote and, unfortunately, bring down the overall good-time party appeal of this disc. Still, fans of Lil' Ed & the Blues Imperials, or electric modern blues in general, will want to add this to their collections.

To call this collection of tunes from blues legend Buddy Guy definitive is not a stretch by any means, as it is a cohesive, thoughtful, chronological collection that accurately represents all of his changes and phases through six decades. Overall, it is a mellow compilation that showcases many of Guy's laid-back songs, several with longtime partner Junior Wells. It's sprinkled with the many all-star bluesmen he has collaborated with over the years, and is tastefully programmed to offer what is essentially cream of the crop blues from one of its enduring legends. Your hear music issued on singles, LPs and CDs recorded from 1958 through 2004 via various recordings done for the Artistic, Chess, Delmark, Vanguard, Blue Thumb, Atco, Evidence, Alligator, JSP, Blind Pig, and Silvertone labels. It really is a comprehensive overview of Guy's best known songs, and gives fans or neophytes an accurate big picture of why Buddy Guy remains one of the most influential artists in American popular music.

Rounder's four-CD Box of the Blues is, by looking at its inclusion of tracks, seemingly an ambitious proposition. But looks can be deceiving. Compiled and introduced by vice president of A&R Scott Billington - a man whose credentials, when it comes to fighting for and preserving blues traditions, are unassailable - these discs become a kind of theme-oriented blur of Rounder's substantial catalog holdings. Billington's schemata are quirky, sometimes ironic, and sometimes downright scary and profound as the set's first and second discs' "61 Highway" and "One More Mile" attest. The first CD concentrates its energies on the revelation of blues as it came up from the Mississippi Delta in the music of Fred McDowell, Johnny Shines, Etta Baker, Blind Willie McTell, John Hurt, and others and mutated up north to Chicago with Otis Spann, Robert Nighthawk, and others…