Check out John Lee Hooker Jr.’s new All Odds Against Me, if you want to know what I’m getting at. There are horns, and funk lines, and bits of hip-hop aesthetic scattered through it that offer pleasant surprises among what are very deep-rooted blues tunes. But also check out that new Vanguard Visionaries series if you’re looking for more of what inspired Baker in the first place, and you’ll find plenty of tracks that are stripped positively raw.
In the end, a successful blues album in this day and age comes mostly down to charisma and feel. Do you believe the music that’s being played? Are they playing the blues because they absolutely have to, or because it’s a costume worth trying on for look and feel?
Baker and company pass these tests by my reckoning, but there may be no genre more personal than the blues, and you’ll just have to decide whether the SGs get your gut going or not.
The Blues Won’t Wait | Released by Pam Baker and the SGs on Klarity Music | at Freeport Cabaret, in Freeport | September 27 | at Frog & Turtle, in Westbrook | October 10 |www.pambakerblues.com
Sam Pfeifle can be reached at sam_pfeifle@yahoo.com.
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