Tony's Picks - 2022

It’s that time of year when every music/movie/book critic puts out his/her favorites for the year. I’ve done only one of these in the past few years because I simply didn’t have the time or energy to do it. This year I have plenty of time. I'm not so much a critic as I am a fan. Last year’s list was fairly eclectic with progressive rock, metal, English pop, some Americana, and a chick singer. For the most part, this year’s list has a bluish tint.

Bonnie Raitt - Just Like That... [2022] – Death casts a shadow over this collection of songs, and since it was recorded while the pandemic was raging, why not? There’s a convicted murder who seeks redemption as a prison hospice worker in Down the Hall. In the title track there’s the stranger who shows up unannounced on a woman’s doorstep after he received her dead son’s heart via transplant. Bonnie alludes to those no longer with us in Livin’ for the Ones, when she proclaims “If you ever start to bitch and moan, just remember the ones who won’t ever feel the sun on their faces again.” For the rest of the album, you get what one comes to expect with a Bonnie Raitt release ever since Nick of Time [1989], and we’re better off for it.

Buddy Guy - The Blues Don't Lie [2022] – The last of the blues giants is finally slowing down. His tour to support The Blues Don't Lie has been billed as the farewell tour. Unlike others who’ve had farewell tours only to come back [The Who, Kiss, Ozzy], I’ve got a feeling that at age 86, this one will stick. Since 2008, Tom Hambridge has been Buddy Guy’s producer, and since 2008 there’s been a formula. Guest musicians? Check. Songs written by Hambridge, Gary Nicholson, and/or Richard Fleming? Check. Playing like the assassin that Jimi Hendrix wanted to be? Check. For the most part Buddy has been recording the same album for over thirty years, not that there’s anything wrong with that. The only thing that doesn’t work here is “I’ve Got a Feeling.” Buddy Guy and the Beatles are mutually exclusive, and they should remain that way.

Eric Gales – Crown [2022] – “My name is Eric Gales – any questions?” So begins this superb album. Once upon a time, Eric Gales was a blues prodigy. He released his first album when he was sixteen. Eighteen albums, descent into drug addiction and some jail time later, Gales releases a flawless album. Produced by fellow blues prodigy Joe Bonamassa and his partner in crime Josh Smith, Crown has the blues, rock, soul, rhythm & blues, funk, a little bit of swing, a healthy dose of horns, and guitar heroics – lots of guitar heroics. Most of the songs are written by Gales, Bonamassa and Smith, Gales sings about race, jail, getting knocked down and getting back up, his wife [who sings backup and takes lead vocals for Take Me Just As I Am]. Check out Gales’ guitar duel with Joe Bonamassa on the title track. Somewhere Jimi Hendrix and Stevie Ray Vaughan are smiling. I have one question, Eric – why has it taken this long for me to find you?

Larry McCray - Blues Without You [2022] – Like Eric Gales’ Crown, this too was produced by Joe Bonamassa and Josh Smith. Those two are getting pretty good at the record production thing. The lead-off song Arkansas is a smoking autobiographical, horn-laden, funky statement of intent. Without Love It Doesn’t Matter changes things up immediately thereafter with a Fats Domino groove. Breaking News, with a 1970s sound of horns and strings, draws inspiration from the steady drumbeat of bad news heard every night. Roadhouse Blues [not to be confused with the Doors song of the same name] is Albert King territory. Drinkin’ Liquor and Chasin’ Women is back to the Fats Domino vibe [thanks to Reese Wynans]. Down to the Bottom is a big ballad with Warren Haynes. Mr. Easy is a slower, funkier tune with exceptional horns and the guitar talents of Joe Bonamassa. The album closes with a solo acoustic blues called I Play the Blues. I’m not sure which is the better album – Crown or Blues Without You – but both would be worthy additions to your blues collection.

Los Lobos - Native Sons [2021] – This came out last year, but I didn’t buy it until this year. Musicians had lots of time on their hands when COVID hit, many of whom recorded new music with imaginative titles including the word “lockdown.” Los Lobos put some thought into what they would call their collection of songs recorded under similar conditions. This is a covers album [except for one original song, the title track], but this one has a theme – it features a dozen songs originally written and recorded by artists from Los Angeles. Their choice of songs reflects the melting pot that is LA music. They cover the Chicano side with Thee Midniters, Lalo Guerrero, and Willie Bobo. I admit to being ignorant of their music, but as luck would have it, the one song I did recognize was Lalo Guerrero’s Los Chucos Suaves, which I heard him sing on Ry Cooder’s Chavez Ravine album [on which David Hidalgo played]. They venture to the black side with War’s The World Is a Ghetto. Their clever medley of Buffalo Springfield’s Bluebird and For What It’s Worth brilliantly captures the interplay of the guitar parts as done by Stephen Stills, Neil Young and Richie Furay. They keep the original arrangements but add their own Los Lobos spin. One band I never imagined Los Lobos would cover is the Beach Boys, but they chose wisely which song to cover – Sail On Sailor. The other knuckleball they threw me was when they ventured into singer/songwriter territory with Jackson Browne’s Jamaica Say You Will.  Only once did they pay tribute to one of their contemporaries – The Blasters [Flat Top Joint].  This eclectic set of songs is a good companion piece to The Ride/Ride This [2004], which included performances from a couple of the artists covered here [The Blasters’ Dave Alvin and Thee Midniters Little Willie G.]. Covers albums are ok for a stopgap, but I would love to hear original music from this great band.

Tears for Fears - The Tipping Point [2022] – Here’s something that is completely unlike anything on this list. I have always been a sucker for good English pop, and this one’s pretty good. Eighteen years had passed since TFF’s last album [Everybody Loves a Happy Ending]. They wanted to record another album shortly after that last album, but Roland Orzabal’s wife got sick. She died in 2017, then Orzabal had his own bouts with ill health. He turned to his TFF partner Curt Smith to create something new. What resulted was a collection of songs dealing with loss, grief, and reconciliation. Given my own circumstance, this hit home, and it spoke to me – I knew the feeling all too well. That is reason enough for me to include this on my list.

Edgar Winter – Brother Johnny [2022] – Johnny Winter has been gone since 2014, when he passed away in Zurich while on tour. His brother Edgar resisted doing a tribute album. He felt like doing so soon after his brother’s death would be exploitative. Eight years have passed, and Edgar reconsidered – the time was finally right. For this album he gathered many guitarists - Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Joe Bonamassa, Warren Haynes, Derek Trucks [without his wife for once], Billy Gibbons, David Grissom, Joe Walsh, Steve Lukather [yeah, the Toto guy], Doyle Bramhall II, and Keb’ ‘Mo. Oddly enough Rick Derringer is nowhere to be found here. Edgar sings some but not all of the songs. His voice has gotten gravelly over the years, but this is the blues, so it works. Rather than go song-by-song because they’re almost all good, I’ll single out one as being great – Mean Town Blues. Edgar sings, Joe Bonamassa plays. I single this one out because, if you close your eyes while you listen, you can hear Johnny Winter. Joe B nails Johnny’s tone. This is an Edgar Winter CD, but it’s his brother’s music, and it’s wonderful.

Gov’t Mule - Heavy Load Blues [2022] – Ever since the Allman Brothers Band called it a day in 2014 [and Gregg Allman’s subsequent death two and a half years later], Gov’t Mule has been the next best thing for me.  I have followed the Mule since the beginning, when Warren Haynes and Allen Woody were still in the Allman Brothers and Gov’t Mule was still a side gig.  In those 28 years hence, Heavy Load Blues is the first [and hopefully not last] “all-blues” album. Of the twenty-one songs that make up the two-disk version, thirteen of them are songs by Little Milton, Bobby ‘Blue’ Bland, Junior Wells, Howlin’ Wolf, Elmore James, and Muddy Waters among others. The remaining songs have the blues vibe but have the hard rock ethos we’ve come to expect from Gov’t Mule. One foot in the blues, indeed. I saw Gov’t Mule twice this year, and the “new” songs were fabulous. Eleven years ago, Warren Haynes recorded an R&B/soul album under his own name, Man In Motion. It’s the blues side of soul [the “B” in R&B is “blues," after all]. I think of Heavy Load Blues and Man In Motion as companion pieces. Buy both of them.

Walter Trout – Ride [2022] – Walter Trout is one of the best blues guitarists nobody has heard of. I saw him open for Gregg Allman in Sacramento in 1998. I loved what I heard and have been a fan ever since. Ride is his 30^th [!] album, a superb follow-up to his equally superb Ordinary Madness [2020] album. Trout’s music is joyous, or at least as joyous as the blues can be. He can step on the gas and go full throttle, or he can ease back and play a slow, minor-chord blues that would make Gary Moore or Peter Green proud. A ferocious soloist, this 71-year-old blues man shows no signs of fading into “adult contemporary Hell,” unlike a British guitarist of renown I could mention.

Mike Campbell & The Dirty Knobs - External Combustion [2022] – I never saw Tom Petty live. This year I saw the next best thing, Mike Campbell and his band The Dirty Knobs. I saw them open for Gov’t Mule in October. Wouldn’t you know they played a fairly Tom Petty-centric set, but I digress. External Combustion is this unit’s second album [Wreckless Abandon (2020) being their first]. During his life as a Heartbreaker, Mike Campbell never had to write an entire album’s worth of material himself. With a songwriter as great as Tom Petty he never had to. Now he’s done it twice, and he’s made the transition from being Tom Petty’s co-pilot to front man look easy. It can’t be easy to start your career over when you’re seventy, but Mike Campbell has done it. In addition to the hard-hitting rock one comes to expect from the Dirty Knobs, they cover more stylistic bases - rockabilly [Bridget Bardot], “country”-ish rock [Electric Gypsy], ballads [State of Mind, In This Lifetime], boogie [Lightning Boogie], and ELO/Revolver-era Beatles [Cheap Talk]. With External Combustion, Mike Campbell & the Dirty Knobs have avoided the sophomore slump.

Johnny Winter - Roots/Step Back

In 2004, Johnny Winter released an album [at that time his first in 12 years] called I’m a Bluesman.  It was a good record, but not a great one.  Some complained [rightly so] that his vocals had lost their ferocity, as had his playing.  There is a reason for this.  Johnny’s former manager, Teddy Slatus, kept him secluded, and kept him on methadone [for 30 years!] and anti-depression meds.  Slatus even kept his brother Edgar away from Johnny.  But Johnny Winter had a secret weapon.  His name is Paul Nelson.  Already the second guitarist in Johnny’s road band, he asked Nelson if he would be his manager.  He did so after Johnny fired Slatus, and Nelson began to make some changes.  He allowed people to communicate with Johnny Winter, who also credited Nelson to getting him kick all the drugs, all the booze, and even quit smoking.  He once said “I never thought I would see the day that I didn’t have any vices at all.”  Once all those vices were gone, the voice got stronger, and the playing got stronger.

Once he was well enough to record, the plan was simple.  When JW asked Nelson what he should put down, Nelson suggested that JW record songs that inspired him.  JW liked the idea, and the concept of Roots was born.  Not only would they record one “roots” album, the two men planned on recording four of them.  Not only did they record blues songs, but also old rock and roll songs from the 1950s.  The plan was also to have other artists [most of whom had worked with JW before] make guest appearances.  Other older stars have made duet records before [Frank Sinatra and BB King immediately come to mind], but these “duet” records would have a twist.  The “duets” would not be with vocals [with two exceptions] – they would be with the instruments.  There are plenty of guitarists on these albums.  After hearing I’m a Bluesman, I was worried that any and/or all the guests would upstage Johnny.  I need not have worried.  Johnny Winter’s recovery from his addictions took hold, and he went toe-to-toe with his guests with ease. 

In 2014 Johnny Winter followed Roots with Step Back.  The plan for Step Back was the same as Roots.  I think of both albums as part of the same work, hence this blog about both of them.  When asked earlier in 2014 what was left for Johnny Winter to accomplish, he responded that he sure would like to win a Grammy®.  Last month, Step Back won the Grammy® for Best Blues Album of 2014.  Too bad Johnny Winter didn’t live to see it happen.

Roots [2011]

T-Bone Shuffle

Further On Up The Road

Done Somebody Wrong

Got My Mojo Working

Last Night

Maybellene

Bright Lights, Big City

Honky Tonk

Dust My Broom

Short Fat Fannie

Come Back Baby

Step Back [2014]

Unchain My Heart

Can’t Hold Out [Talk To Me Baby]

Don’t Want No Woman

Killing Floor

Who Do You Love

Okie Dokey Stomp

Sweet Sixteen

Where Can You Be

Death Letter

My Babe

Long Tall Sally

Mojo Hand

Blue Monday

The home runs:

Dust My Broom – words escape me on how good this one is.  Johnny Winter and Derek Trucks duel on the slide.  Too bad Derek doesn’t play like this on his own albums.

Death Letter – This is the only acoustic slide song between the two collections.  JW was always great at this sort of thing.  What a shame he never recorded an entire album of this stuff.

Don’t Want No Woman – Johnny Winter sure loved Elmore James.  Him and Eric Clapton together – what could go wrong?

Can’t Hold Out [Talk To Me Baby] – Ben Harper sings and plays his lap steel.

Met Expectations:

T-Bone Shuffle

Done Somebody Wrong

Sweet Sixteen

Where Can You Be

My Babe

Further On Up the Road

Short Fat Fannie

Muddy and The Wolf:  No album of blues covers is complete without at least a nod to Muddy Waters and/or Howlin’ Wolf.  Johnny Winter just happened to do my favorites from Muddy and the Wolf – Got My Mojo Workin’ and Killing Floor.  Very nice!

Instrumentals:  There are two of them, both from Clarence Gatemouth Brown:  Okie Dokie Stomp and Honky Tonk.  Both are very good.

The Pleasant Surprises:

Come Back Baby – I heard Clapton do this on his From the Cradle collection.  I liked that one a lot.  This one is better.

Mojo Hand – Joe Perry was pretty good here.  If he ever decides to stop playing chick music with Aerosmith, he could have a future in the blues.  Too bad he can’t sing…

Picks from Left Field:

Unchain My Heart – Johnny Winter takes a turn at an old Ray Charles song.  The result isn’t bad, it’s just mind-blowing.

Maybelline – Not only did I not expect Johnny Winter to do another Chuck Berry song in his career, I really didn’t expect Vince Gill to come along for the ride.  This is most excellent.

Blue Monday – Johnny Winter sings Fats Domino!  I didn’t see that one coming…

Songs I can do without: 

Bright Lights, Big City – There must be some clause in every contract that Derek Trucks signs that says “if you work with me, you have to work with my wife.”  In the blues community, Susan Tedeschi is becoming almost as ubiquitous as Sheryl Crow is in the rock/pop world.  That is not a compliment.   I’m still not a member of The Church of Susan.

Last Night – If you have heard one John Popper harmonica solo, you have heard them all.  He ruins an otherwise fine take on this Little Walter gem with his overplaying.

Long Tall Sally – The only person on the planet who should be allowed to sing Little Richard songs [besides the man himself] is Paul McCartney.  Vocally, Johnny Winter is no Paul McCartney.

Both Roots and Step Back are worthy additions to any Johnny Winter collections.  They make a fitting epitaph for a Texas bluesman who is sorely missed.