Any time you’ve got an album cover with the musician wielding a pick ax, you’re going to get my attention. This guy Andrew Alli plays the harmonica like a Category 4 Hurricane, and sings like he was weaned on vinegar on this album of blueswailing material fresh from the Chitlin’ Circuit. He mixes and matches with a gritty team of Jon Atkinson/g-b, Carl Sonny Leyland/p, Danny Michel/g and Devin Neel or buddy Honeycutt/dr for a dozen rib sticking tracks, mostly composed by the ax man.
He mixes it up between instrumental boogie and bluesers with some stomping vocals. Of the latter, there’s a nasty sounding shuffle on “Hard Workin’ Man”, a dirt under the nails “Easy Going Man,” a trip to Chicago’s South Side” with some wailing guitar on “Good Things” and an easy shade of indigo for “One More Chance.” The team boogaloos like Tipitina on “Going Down South” while on the instrumentals you might want to catch the license plates of the truck that hits you on “Chrom-A-Thick” while you get a heavy 8 to the bar on “AA Boogie” and some finger licking good piano work on “So Long”. Nothing fancy-this is just a blue plate special of the taproot of American music, and you need to hear it from someone, so sit down, order a bear, wipe off the table cloth and take in the sounds!