Bbobby Rush Rawer Than Raw

It's unfortunate that Tom Rush's third album has such a strong reputation among rock listeners – not that it doesn't deserve it, but it sort of distracts them from this album, which was as natural a fit for rock listeners as any folk album of its era. Rush's debut album is filled with a hard, bluesy brand of folk music that's hard on the acoustic guitar strings and not much easier on his voice; he sings stuff like "Long John" and "If Your Man Gets Busted" with a deep, throaty baritone that's only a little less raw than John Hammond's was while doing his work of the same era. Rush had the misfortune to be equated with Bob Dylan, but he had a more easygoing and accessible personality that comes out on numbers here such as Woody Guthrie's "Do-Re-Mi" and Kokomo Arnold's "Milkcow Blues," which are thoroughly enjoyable and quietly (but totally) beguiling. Additionally, he isn't such a purist that he felt above covering a Leiber & Stoller number such as "When She Wants Good Lovin'."

Bobby Rush was a journeyman blues singer, most famous for the novelty hit "Chicken Heads." On this album, however, he took his decades of his experience and his close study of Howlin' Wolf and made an urban blues album for his times, incorporating touches of Philadelphia soul, street-corner harmonies, and the rhythms of the pulpit. He tackled modern injustice ("Evil Is") alongside Seventies sexual mores ("I Can't Find My Keys"); Rush Hour was the first album in a sequence of ever-stranger "folk-funk" explorations. What We Said Then: "Rush Hour is so weird that it's a wonder George Clinton didn't think of it first. . .What emerges is outrageous and stunning. . .In a time when most black pop music sounds machine crafted, this record is more than an anomaly. Rush Hour is a tribute to resilience–a sign that the lessons Howlin' Wolf and his peers learned and taught have been neither lost nor forgotten. You're going to need something like this to get you through the Eighties".

Otis Rush and Buddy Guy were hot young Chicago guitar slingers in the 1950s, when legends like Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf ruled the Second City. Rush was renowned for his nasty, over-amplified guitar sound, and songs like "All Your Love" and "Double Trouble" were seminal touchstones for such `60s British guitarists as Eric Clapton and Peter Green. Rush has lately been known more for live shows than records, and 1994's Ain't Enough Comin' In succeeded because it was programmed like a great concert set, with fat guitar solos that suggested Albert King in a sweat, and songs that drew from both the blues and soul songbooks. Rush sounds great singing Sam Cooke's good-news gospel ("Somebody Have Mercy" and "Ain't That Good News") and pays his propers to Ray Charles on "A Fool for You." Exciting takes on epic tunes associated with B.B. King ("It's My Own Fault") and Albert King ("As the Years Go Passing By") also leave no doubt that Rush hasn't forgotten how to burn down the house.

Moving Pictures, Rush’s eighth studio album, was originally released on February 12, 1981, and its adventurous yet accessible music catapulted the forward-thinking Canadian band to even newer heights as it began navigating the demands of a new decade. The album’s seven songs expertly blended Rush’s intrinsic prowess for channeling its progressive roots into radio-friendly arrangements, a template the band had mastered to a T all throughout its previous album, 1980’s deservedly lauded Permanent Waves. Moving Pictures was also the second of many Rush recording sessions at Le Studio in Morin-Heights, Quebec, which was ultimately nicknamed the trio’s own personal Abbey Road recording studio.

This is a riot! Rather than put out some windy and dreary box set to celebrate their 30th anniversary, Canada's seminal power prog band and one of big rock's most enduring units turns the tables and lays out hot and heavy covers of eight classics from the annals of rock & roll history. The track list is amazing, and the cool thing is that the arrangements of these nuggets are not all ripped up and mutated, either. "Summertime Blues" may begin as a nod to Jimi Hendrix's "Foxy Lady," but it comes roaring back as an acknowledged homage to the Who's Live at Leeds version.

Rush's career reached an important milestone in 2011 – the 30th anniversary of the release of the band's masterpiece, Moving Pictures. Its U.S. sales of more than four million copies shows that this is the album that even casual fans like. (Even those who don't "like" Rush tend to like "Tom Sawyer.") The Canadian trio celebrated the 1981 best-seller with the Time Machine tour, featuring a performance of the album in its entirety. The two-CD set Time Machine 2011: Live in Cleveland captures Rush's sold-out concert on April 15, 2011, at the Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland, Ohio. Previous live albums were recorded outside the United States, so Rush decided to do this one in the first major city to embrace the band after its hometown of Toronto…

Otis Rush is a stunning vocalist, innovative guitarist and songwriter who has hugely influenced blues and rock artists, including Johnny Winter, Stevie Ray Vaughan (whose band, Double Trouble, was named after Rush's song of the same name), Jeff Beck, and Carlos Santana. Rush was inspired to become a bluesman after he moved to Chicago in the late forties and saw Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf perform. Along with Buddy Guy and Magic Slim, Rush developed a playing style that would become known as the "West Side sound," an emotionally intense combination of guitar licks and expressive vocals, with an urban sound that signified a departure from classic Mississippi Delta blues.

Otis Rush's crunching guitar and vocals were never more emphatic than during the '70s when it seemed that he would actually find the pop attention and mass stardom he deserved. These mid-'70s tracks were originally cut for the Black and Blue label, with Rush playing grinding, relentless riffs and creating waves of sonic brilliance through creatively repeated motifs, jagged notes, and sustained lines and licks, while hollering, screaming, moaning, and wailing. Jimmy Dawkins, an outstanding lead artist in his own right, has also long been one of Chicago's great rhythm artists and shows it by adding plenty of tinkling, crackling figures and lines in the backgrounds. While not as consistently riveting as his live Evidence date, this one is also a valuable Rush document.

This album on the House of Blues label is a bit smoother and more slickly produced (by Rush and famed Memphis producer Willie Mitchell) than Rush's classic, rough-edged Chess recordings, but there's still plenty here to like. With a solid horn section backing him on most cuts, Rush gets ample room to show off his razor-sharp guitar chops. And his distinctive, emotionally charged voice remains a true blues treasure. In addition to his own no-nonsense originals, Rush draws on some familiar tunes from classic soul and blues performers like Marvin Gaye, Sam Cooke, Nappy Brown, and Little Milton.