St. Louis has a blues tradition that stretches back to the post
WWI migration of Black laborers up the Mississippi to industrial
jobs in northern cities. Along with their high hopes and matchbox
luggage, they brought the musical traditions of the Delta. In
St. Louis, those mixed with the ragtime piano traditions already
in place to bring us a distinctive boogie-woogie style. The
St. Louis blues tradition lives on today in the clubs of the
South Broadway district and the performances of musicians like
the three in The Bottoms Up Blues Gang.
Singer Kari Liston, guitarist Jeremy Segel-Moss and harmonicist
Adam Andrews produce a much fuller sound than the lineup might
suggest, even when not augmented by some of the guests that
periodically appear on their debut CD. The most notable addition
is pianist Matt Murdick, whose presence allows Segel-Moss, a
rock solid rhythm guitar player for the most part, to open up
and demonstrate some impressive facility as a lead player as
well.
In
addition to singing, Liston adds some original songs into
the group's set of blues standards, but it's hard to tell
the originals from the classics, they're that good. She's
a very effective stylist, with an emotional richness that
belies her relative youth. Andrews rounds out the lineup with
a harmonica that fills the place of a keyboardist, a horn
section, a harmony vocalist, a lead guitarist or just about
anything else that might be missing, and fills those places
completely.
What
I'm saying is that this is an extraordinary debut from three
extraordinary young St. Louis bluespersons, and you ought
to book a flight for South Broadway or take a quicker trip
to www.bottomsupblues.com for your own copy just about now.
Track
List:
Train
I Ride * Meet Me Out Back * Catfish * Key To The Highway *
Ain't Nobody's Business * I Don't Need You * First Time Blues
* Smokestack Lightning * I Don't Want No Man * Just A Little
Bit * Everyday I Have The Blues * Who Do You Love
©
2003 - Shaun Dale
South Broadway Blues samplers are
here!
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