Intteresting Guy

A one-time event stemming from an offer to percussionist Guy Evans to do anything he wanted at the Union Chapel in London. An idea to collaborate with Peter Hammill on a variety of semi- improvisational material partly built on samples of Hammill's music soon expanded to incorporate more traditional performance ideas as well as connections to Evans' own colleagues in the Echo City troupe…

Making sure that country-blues starts the 21st century off on the right foot, Guy Davis' Butt Naked Free, whose title was inspired by the comments of Davis' young son, is one of the most accomplished statements the genre has offered in a few years. Picking up where 1998's You Don't Know My Mind left off, Davis once again has decided to fill out his sound, but this time adding touches of mandolin, organ and accordion, with the results being altogether more satisfying and never sounding even slightly overproduced. Where Davis on his previous album sounded, at times, unsure of his new direction, Butt Naked Free rocks with a loose liveliness, still allowing Davis' derivative yet idiosyncratic sound to shine through. "Waiting on the Cards to Fall" and "Never Met No Woman Treats Me Like You Do," the latter with Levon Helm contributing drums and mandolin, showcase how well Davis' sound fills out and offers the unique experience of hearing what it might have sounded like if Mance Lipscomb or Reverend Gary Davis had ever recorded with full-band accompaniment.

Considering the troubled background of this album (Eric Clapton, Ahmet Ertegun, and Tom Dowd only ended up with eight tracks at a series of 1970 sessions in Miami; two years later, the J. Geils Band was brought in to cut two additional songs to round out the long-delayed LP for 1972 release), the results were pretty impressive. Buddy Guy contributes dazzling lead axe to their revival of "T-Bone Shuffle"; Junior Wells provides a sparkling remake of Sonny Boy's "My Baby She Left Me," and Guy is entirely credible in a grinding Otis Redding mode on the Southern soul stomper "A Man of Many Words."

Brahms’s Trio op.114, originally conceived for clarinet (like the two Sonatas op.120), is presented here in its version with viola: ‘Like all Brahms’s works, this trio is a vocal, melodic piece. And the viola is perhaps the instrument of the string quartet that comes closest to the human voice’, says violist Miguel Da Silva. ‘This version with viola obliges me, as a cellist, to listen differently: our two stringed instruments must “breathe” together and match their articulation’, continues Xavier Phillips. These three works from late in Brahms’s career testify to his modernity: ‘Brahms was often considered a classical composer who was impervious to modernity, the guardian of a certain tradition’, says pianist François-Frédéric Guy, who agrees with Schoenberg that he was, on the contrary, highly innovative: ‘We have a fine example, in the trio, of the extraordinary modernity of his combinations of rhythm and timbre: he is a total innovator.'

On Buddy Guy's second Silvertone release, he continues the practice of guest appearances begun on Damn Right, I've Got the Blues. In this case, the notables include Paul Rodgers, Travis Tritt, and John Mayall. The finest combination comes when Bonnie Raitt joins Guy on John Hiatt's "Feels Like Rain." Raitt's gritty vocals and sweet slide guitar add a pleasing nuance to the bittersweet track, and it is ultimately the high point of the record. Certain critics and blues purists have derided Guy's search for mainstream success as evidenced by his penchant for guest appearances and non-traditional blues forms, but Guy sounds fantastic in these unconventional situations (witness his burning version of the Moody Blues' "I Go Crazy").

Live at Legends captures the raging bluesman during a blistering set at his club in early 2010, playing pretty much exactly what you'd expect: "Damn Right I Got the Blues," "Best Damn Fool," and medleys of "I Just Want to Make Love to You/Chicken Heads," "Boom Boom/Strange Brew," and "Voodoo Chile/Sunshine of Your Love." That said, this isn't a complaint. While it's true that Guy and his crack band have his show down cold - this same basic set has been around for at least a decade with some additions and substitutions made while on tour playing larger venues - they throw down each and every time. Given that this is his club, the senses of immediacy and a certain closeness are present here whereas they're missing on other live recordings.