Enrico Crivellaro’s brand new album on Electro-Fi Records is entitled Free Wheelin’. The record is just that. The great Italian blues guitarist stretches out with a batch of instrumentals. The CD is a mix of original material written by Crivellaro and his very talented keyboard player Pietro Taucer who moves effortlessly between a grand piano, a Hammond C3 and a Fender Rhodes. There is also a pair of interesting covers including Ellington’s In a Sentimental Mood. I have been grooving to the Earl Hooker penned tune Universal Rock which gets the Crivellaro treatment on this fine CD.

Fred Kaplan’s brand new self released CD entitled, Hold My Mule is a generous 17 song helping of originals all written by the great pianist. The entire record was recorded live in the studio. The CD features long time Kaplan collaborators, guitarist Junior Watson and drummer Richard Innes. They are joined by bassist Kedar Roy and exceptionally talented sax man, Gordon Beadle. What makes the greatest blues songs and albums special is a timeless quality. This recording is very special for the same reason. The CD receives my highest recommendation. I could have gone in any number of directions but I dropped a nickel on a calypso imbibed blues number, entitled Tropical Ivories where both Watson and Beadle take simply beautiful solos.

When the guitar Gods made Junior Watson they broke the mold. His attack on the  instrument is like no one who has ever played. Sure he owes a great deal to his idols Oscar Moore, Earl Hooker, Bill Jennings, Pee Wee Crayton and especially, Tiny Grimes, but Watson formed his own voice years ago and subsequently has become one of the most influential and respected guitarists of his generation. His brand new release Jumpin’ Wit’ Junior is only the third solo recording in his long career. It is, in many ways, the companion piece to Fred Kaplan’s brand new album in that each record shares many of the same players. Kaplan’s piano playing for instance is all over this record. Of the album's 15 tracks, all but three are instrumentals. I have been grooving to the tune Velvet Mood where you can hear Watson’s influences coalesce around his own spontaneous voice. Fred Kaplan’s exceptional piano playing is also featured on this number.

Nathan James & The Rhythm Scratchers' Delta Groove Records debut, What You Make of It, came out on March 20th. The 33 year old James moves away, for the moment anyway, from the solo acoustic blues that has been the hallmark of his already prolific career. He is joined here by bassist and harmonica player Troy Sandow and drummer Marty Dodson for a more eclectic and electrified presentation. James has been the long time guitarist in the James Harman band and Harman guests on one track. Two songs even feature the horn section of Johnny Viau and Archie Thompson. The Jimmy McCracklin classic Later On is given a fresh take by the uber-talented wunderkind Nathan James.

The prolific Rhode Island based guitarist extraordinaire, Duke Robillard, returned to a more  traditional blues based sound last fall with his Stony Plain release Low Down and Tore Up. That however was last fall and, true to form, Robillard pulls yet another album out of the hat that heads in an entirely different direction. His most recent effort which came out earlier this year is entitled Wobble Walkin’ and is billed as the Duke Robillard Jazz Trio. It has been released on Robillard’s own Blue Duchess Record label. Robillard is joined on this outing by long time band mates bassist Brad Hallen and drummer Mark Texeira. The title track is a Duke Robillard original. This song is an instrumental, as are all the tunes on this album, save one exception. This number has an early 1960s beatnik, jazz hipster cool vibe.

The Royal Rhythmaires are the subject of our May Monthly Artist Spotlight feature.  Their April, 2012, self released debut album entitled Shuck And Jive gives listeners a fresh look at some old school style rhythm & blues. This Fort Worth, Texas based ensemble features the wonderful singing of newcomer Jai Malano. Malano and the rest of the band sound like they would be right at home on a Central Avenue nightclub circa 1950. The old Roy Brown tune Love Don’t Love Nobody  has always been one of my favorites. It gets TRR's honkin’ horn driven treatment as do the rest of the tunes on this great record.

Vocalist and harmonica player R.J. Mischo had an album that came out May 15th entitled Make it Good. On Mischo’s Delta Groove records debut, the Minnesota native went down to Texas to record with some of the best musicians in the Lone Star State including guitarists Nick Curran and Johnny Moeller, bassist Ronnie James Webber and drummer Wes Starr. Mischo is also joined by guitarist Jeremy Johnson, who is a ubiquitous prescence on the Minnesota blues scene. I have been grooving to the instrumental Frozen Pickle from this fine album. This is Mischo’s tenth album and it is also his best. 

Red Lotus Revue's May release is the band’s debut full length CD. The self produced, self-released disc is entitled Fourteen Stories. Half the tracks were written by the band's vocalist/harmonica player Karl Cabbage and guitarist Jimmy Zollo. Guitarist Pete Fazzini and drummer Kurt Kalker round out this San Diego based quartet who deliver a post-war Chicago sound that is deeply rooted in that tradition. The album also features wonderfully obscure covers of Otis Smothers, Johnny Shines, Jimmy Reed and others. I chose an original tune called Barkin’ that sounds like it could have been recorded 60 years ago. 

Curtis Salgado's April 10th release on Alligator Records, Soul Shot, is one of the best contemporary  soul albums to drift across my ears in recent memory. He is backed up by the great Phantom Blues Band. The real star here though is Salgado’s singing which is as fully realized on this recording than anything he has done in his career. Salgado and the band cover such luminaries as O.V. Wright, Otis Redding, Johnny “Guitar” Watson and others. It is however the album's closing track that is a gospel infused, Salgado original, A Woman or the Blues. This song, like others on the record, also features Salgado’s harmonica playing which he employs sparingly giving more impact to every note he plays. 

The Blasters have released their first album since 2006. It is entitled Fun on a Saturday Night and it is their debut on the Southern California based label Rip Cat Records. The album is reviewed in the July edition of BLUES JUNCTION and true to Blasters form, the CD is an American roots music album that has elements of first generation rock&roll, country, gospel, rockabilly, soul and blues. Alvin is joined by Excene Cervenka on a duet of the old June Carter/Johnny Cash tune, Jackson. It is an interesting choice that works. This song and the rest of this fine album, like The Blasters is a lot of fun.

The Mannish Boys' Delta Groove Music, May 15th release entitled Double Dynamite is a double CD that is in the Mannish Boys tradition of featuring a generous helping of special guests. The album's two distinctively different discs are the result of the brilliant sequencing by the record's co-producer Jeff Scott Fleenor. Disc One is entitled Atomic Blues. It is a low down, Chicago style blues album with one mid tempo shuffle after another. The band and their guests take on numerous blues standards including familiar tunes written by “Little” Walter Jacobs, Muddy Waters. Willie Dixon, Sonny Boy Williamson 2, Robert Nighthawk and others. The second disc on the new Mannish Boys' album is called Rhythm & Blues Explosion.  On this disc you will find horn arrangements, some B-3 organ and back-up vocals. The entire disc has a west coast feel and is my personal favorite between the two CDs. My favorite track however just might be the T-Bone Walker classic, You Don’t Love Me. It features Finis Tasby on vocals. The tune also has Kid Ramos on guitar, Fred Kaplan on piano and Bill Stuve on upright bass.