Most Helpful Customer Reviews
|
|
9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
DAMN RIGHT I HAVE THE MOTTS, July 21, 2001
When Buddy Guy played the Hard Rock Café in Bangkok in 1992, he was asked which present day `Blues' guitarists he liked. Buddy just laughed and said that he was the only real blues guitarist left, as everybody else was just in it for the money. He told the story of when he had followed Muddy Waters up to Chicago from Mississippi in the 50's. Muddy Waters was broke and Buddy wanted to be just like him, in fact on his first meeting with his idol, he claimed that Muddy had saved his life, as if he hadn't shared his dried salami & cheese with him the young Buddy Guy would have starved to death. For these of you wanting to hear some genuine `Blues' music, recorded in a modern studio with all the sound quality that this gives, this is the album for you. It was, unanimously, voted Blues album of the year by the Grammies in 1992. This album just reeks of class. Buddy used his basic road band of long time bassist Greg Rzab on bass, Mick Weaver on keyboards and Richie Hayward on drums (temporarily borrowed from Little Feat). The group went to Battery studios with producer John Porter, who does a superb job keeping the sound clear and precise. Several musicians stopped round during this period to pay their respects and add a lick here and a solo there. These people included the guitarists, Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton and Mark Knopfler, plus the Memphis Horns. Strangely, one of the weaker moments on the album is "Early In The Morning" which has the Memphis Horns, Clapton & Beck on it. It leaves the feeling that perhaps it was left on the album just to add to the star rating, not for it's actual quality. The other low point on the album is a run through of Sir Mack Rice's "Mustang Sally", a fine song but Buddy does little to distinguish his version from the 500 other cover versions. The rest of the album though is pure golden Blues. The two long, slow Blues workouts are outstanding and allow Buddy to do what he does best, play his guitar. You get eight and a half minutes of the Eddie Boyd Classic "Five Long Years" and seven & a half minutes of "Black Night" by Jesse Robinson. John Porter's production leaves both of these songs stripped to the bone, and let the emotions drip from the guitar & vocals. Spiritually these songs leave you exhausted, but nothing can prepare you for the albums final cut which is Buddy Guy's tribute to his friend, Stevie Ray Vaughn. "Remembering Stevie" is an outstanding instrumental Blues song that literally sends shivers up and down your spine. Close your eyes and you can see Buddy playing with his eyes shut and the band giving sympathetic support, with Stevie looking down from high above. On this album, Buddy Guy makes mere pale imitators of all those that try to follow him. If you want the Blues, go for the real thing, go for Buddy. Mott the Dog.
|
|
|
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Great music, March 26, 2001
This lasts about 54 minutes. 4 tracks feature horns. There are three original Guy tracks. All are great. One- title track, 2- a slow moody instrumental dedicated to Stevie Ray Vaughan, 3-one of Guy's best songs and captures some ferocious guitar playing for 5 minutes and is called Too Broke Too Spend the Night. If you wanted to, you could fit all of these songs into contemporary blues music for either lyrics or music, but only six of the ten tracks fit in a traditional sense. There's 3 slow blues, including the instrumental track called Rememberin' Stevie, the classic Black Night{done by Willie Nelson and Dr. John later}and also Five Long Years another classic covered in Eric Clapton's all blues album From the Cradle. I don't want insult the great musicians on this album, but you could say the only truly remarkable thing about it is Buddy himself. At his top level of playing on this record he is definetely one of the best guitar players in blues. Ups: Alot of powerful vocals. The keyboards are used perfectly, not over or underdone. Let me love you baby is a song that was written by Willie Dixon and one of the last songs Steve Vaughan covered on record and one of Buddy's best recordings. There may be possible downs here for you,though it is all great music. In my opinion the extra guitar players were almost completely unhelpful, and were uneeded at any rate. Of course Mark Knopfler and Eric Clapton didn't take anything away but your ears would have to put mine to shame to be able to distinguish them. Jeff Beck was clear but he didn't do anything Guy couldn't do. Bottom line is that these great guitarists were just for promotion and they probably knew it. As for John Porter and Neil Hubbard who are probably in Guy's live band or studio musicians- One or both played on all tracks including the ones with the other guitarists. They were probably only there for the occasional rythm or tiny sound effect or mimicry and really weren't much help even if they did more. They maybe even taking away from Buddy at times. I can't even understand Guy using them. There were back up vocalists in 3 songs which is an uncommon thing in straight blues. Lastly -highly produced and slightly cluttered with people who may not have belonged. The production may bother some blues fans but did however cause some great sound through the record and didn't take away from the character which Guy and the blues is known for. If you are looking for Guy at a more raw hard blues stage then get Stone Crazy which is a standard- Buddy on lead guitar and his brother Phil doing back-up work-then Bass and drums. It's simple and also one of the classic harcore blues albums.
|
|
|
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
This Got Me Hooked On Buddy Guy!, December 18, 2004
This is the CD that got me hooked on Buddy Guy. I have over 2000 CDs in my collection and I find myself pulling this one out over and over again! As the much younger sibling of and older brother and sister I started listening to all sorts of music in the early sixtys (I was born in '56). My older sister was a music fan and attended the last US Beatles show in SF when I was about 8 years old. I cut my teeth on Rock, Jazz, Blues, etc. and was seriously hooked by the time I was 14 or so. Back to Buddy...
Buddy Guy's guitar playing is always right on and this album is no exception. I not only look to the performance but I need to have a good mix and great sound quality as well. This CD has it all. I'm a Bass player and I love the bass line on Mustang Sally. In fact, this is my favorite cover of this song anyplace I have heard, bar none.
There might be better Buddy Guy CDs than this, but I would bet that if you don't like this one, you don't like the blues!
|
|
|
Most Recent Customer Reviews
|
by Buddy Guy 
