4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Space-age blues, March 20, 2001
This review is from: X-Rey Guitar (Audio CD)
With space-age title and cover art, this CD is firmly grounded in old-fashioned country blues -- but speeded up, caffeinated Seattle-style! The modern West Coast guitar queen Del Rey pays tribute to her idol, the 1930s guitar queen Memphis Minnie, by covering the killer Minnie instrumental "On the Wall" and by performing an original ("Memphis Minnie") that tells the story of Minnie's life while mimicking her various guitar styles. Guitar, as the CD title suggests, is what Del Rey is all about. Her technique, on metal-bodied, finger-picked guitar, is awesome. "On the Wall," for example, was performed by TWO great guitarists (Memphis Minnie and Kansas Joe McCoy) in its original version, but Rey manages to handle it all alone! On "On the Wall," Rey adapts a piano part to her guitar, and on "Charleston Mad" she plays like a whole band. Speaking of bands -- several of the cuts are solo, but on others Rey gets help from sidepeople including harpist Phil Wiggins, fiddler Suzy Thompson, drummer Ben Smith and others.
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