Nice music for sitting at the local Moose Lodge…
NYC’s Sid Whelan mixes bluesy rock with a soulful country stew as he mixes and matches with Trevor Bridgewater/b, Robert Weiss-Richard Huntley/dr, Matthew Whittaker/keys and a horn and percussion section for added oomph. He can tell a good story, sitting on the porch with a guitar for the cozy “Nina Simone” and his voice can range from a country bumpkin on “Make Some Time” to an ominous and haunting howl on the tibal “Legba Ain’t No Devil”. The band gets Tom Waitsy vaudevillian with marimba and a trombone plunging like Kim Kardashian’s neckline on “The Promise” and a lonely guitar cries out on “Midnight IN The Country”. Tales to tell!
Marie martens plays a nasty slide guitar as well as regular guitar as she snarls through a mix of her own tunes and some covers with a bluesy team of Ronnie Cacioppo/voc-perc, Jimmy B Natural/b and Tom Selear/dr. The team is raucous on her gritty and dark “Change My Way” and she slides like Lou Brock on “Movin’ On” while wailing like a Chicago wind on “Mama Won’t Allow Me”. She takes The Rolling Stones’ “Ventilator Blues” and paints it black, with she walks the red clay on the rural “Kokomo Blues”. The team shuffles on Otis Rush’s smoky “Keep Me Loving Me’ and they boogies on the rocking R&B classic “Mama He Treats Your Daughter Mean.” Wouldn’t want to meet her in a dark alley!
Memphis living Will Sexton is a Doug Sham alumnus and delivers a hearty plate of folksy blues and boogie. He mixes things up with some hip Farfisa organ grinding on the noirish punk angst of “Mess Around With My Mind” while some warm tenor sax smoke rings give a nice 50s R&B feel to “Only Forever” while he croons on the mellow “Oh The Night (Night Owl Calls)”. Sexton’s got a hip voice to the grungy 8 to the bar “Don’t Take It From Me” and the twangy blues of the title track casts a long shadow. Walking the blue highway without a ride.