The Duke Robillard Band Duke's Blues

Calling All Blues, the new album from two-time Grammy nominee and multi Blues Music Award winning guitarist Duke Robillard. Recorded fresh off the heals of touring as the guitarist with Bob Dylan's band, Duke Robillard's 2014 CD, Calling All Blues, is a collection of mostly new blues material by one of the genre's best and most creative artists. Robillard is joined by the horn section from Roomful Of Blues, the band he founded in 1967, on four songs. In a career spanning over four decades Duke has also worked with Tom Waits, Fabulous Thunderbirds, and dozens of blues legends.

Between stints with the Fabulous Thunderbirds and his work as a busy session player, Roomful of Blues founder and original guitarist Duke Robillard finds time to work with his own band, one of the most rockin' ensembles extant, highlighted by the vocal support of Susann Forrest. "Turn it Around" is yet another excellent Duke Robillard offering which features guest artist Suzanne Forest. This album was released about the same time as the Fabulous Thunderbirds' "Walk that Walk, Talk that Talk" disc, and Duke's guitar and vocals are on the same high level as on the latter. Add angelic vocals by Ms. Forest and this disc is a superb representation of vintage Duke Robillard. Anybody who enjoys blues, Texas rock 'n roll and r&b needs to add this to their collection.

Robillard, ex-Fab Thunderbird and founder of Roomful of Blues, hits a cool-rockin' groove on the opening, "Midnite Cannonball", and rides it with style, chops and hot horn riffs through the closing 11-minute jam on the late Albert Collins', "Dyin' Flu". A fine mix of originals and classics.

For his 18th album on Stony Plain, Duke Robillard leads his band – Bruce Bears on piano, Brad Hallen on acoustic bass, and Mark Teixeira on drums – through a set of covers of often obscure blues tunes from the late 1940s and early ‘50s. It's as if he is trying to re-create the contents of a jukebox in some Chicago bar of the era, with two songs each drawn from the repertoires of Guitar Slim ("Quicksand," "Later for You Baby"), Tampa Red ("Mercy Mercy Mama," "Let Me Play with Your Poodle"), Sugar Boy Crawford ("Overboard," "What's Wrong"), Pee Wee Crayton ("Blues After Hours," "Do Unto Others"), and Elmore James ("Tool Bag Boogie," "The 12 Year Old Boy"), plus Eddie Taylor's "Trainfare Home," John Lee Hooker's "Want Ad Blues," Jimmy McCracklin's "It's Alright," and Bobby "Blues" Merrill's "I Ain't Mad at You."

Duke Robillard's place in blues history seems secure - the founder of Roomful of Blues, a stint in the Fabulous Thunderbirds, and a veteran of sessions with such venerable bluesmen as Snooky Pryor, Jimmy Witherspoon, John Hammond and Pinetop Perkins, R&B queen Ruth Brown, the king of Kansas City swing Jay McShann, and rock legend Bob Dylan - and in this Dangerous Place, the writer, arranger, producer, singer, guitarist and leader of the Duke Robillard Band presents a total tour de force of all the different dimensions of that deceptively simple music known as "the blues": the brass-stoked swing of "Had To Be Your Man"; the straight-from-the-gut Chicago harp-and-guitar moan of "No Time"; the heartbreak of "All Over But the Paying"…

At age 83, pianist/vocalist Jay McShann was still at the top of his game and providing many lessons for the younger "swing" cats and kittens. He is the epitome of what can be done when jazz and blues are mixed equally, especially when the fun factor is liberally added in. While some might find this typical, many others should revel in the sound of one of this music's last living legends who is still doing it, and doing it very well at that. The chemistry between McShann and guitarist/session leader Duke Robillard is considerable and undeniable, and makes Still Jumpin' the Blues enjoyable throughout. With such solid support from Robillard and the band, McShann has nothing to worry about. Everything you might want is here: classic versions of "Goin' to Chicago," "Ain't Nobody's Business," and "Trouble In Mind"; a nice rearrangement with tempo shift from mellow to mid-tempo on "Sunny Side of the Street"; Maria Muldaur's sultry singing on "Come on Over to My House," and especially the Bessie Smith evergreen "Backwater Blues"; wonderful instrumentals like "Moten Swing" and "Say Forward, I'll March"; and even a little Hawaiian slide accenting "Hootie's K.C. Christmas Prayer".

Duke Robillard’s won a reputation as one of finest guitarists in blues, but this disc also displays his command of rock ‘n’ roll, country, and jazz balladry. The latter drives his duet with country star Pam Tillis, "I’ll Never Be Free," which plays off their easy vocal interplay, Robillard’s classic picking, and his band’s swinging drive. It’s also a pleasure to hear him singing and slinging guitars with blueswoman Debbie Davies on the chugging shuffle "How Long Has It Been." But the best moments may be Robillard’s incendiary solos, like when he uncorks his Stratocaster in the middle of "Deep Inside," matching his lyrics’ cry of aching devotion with a hailstorm of quivering bent notes and brightly snapped strings in sharp, stinging phrases. Three songs later he’s playing in a twang and tremolo style like a Texas roadhouse veteran. In any context, what comes from Robillard’s nimble fingers and open mind is the sound of a master at work.

Best known as the founder of Roomful of Blues and for his short stint with the Fabulous Thunderbirds (replacing Jimmie Vaughan), Duke Robillard had only released two blues albums between 1996 and 2002. Although he was awarded the W.C. Handy Best Blues Guitarist award for 2000 and 2001 and his tireless road work always included plenty of stinging solos, Robillard left the jazz and worldbeat tangents behind for this welcome return to his first love. Those who have followed Robillard's career know that he's never been tied to one style, and Living With the Blues highlights his eclectic talents. Robillard crackles on everything here, from the straight-ahead Chicago approach of Willie Dixon by way of Muddy Waters' "I Live the Life I Love" to the Roomful-styled hard swing of the obscure Willie Egans' "I'm Mad About You Baby" to the acoustic treatment of Tampa Red's "Hard Road" and the jump blues of his own "Sleepin' on It" (reprised from the Roomful years).