filled with highlights, including Boyer’s beau- tiful “Please Be With Me,” the first Cowboy song I ever heard, thanks to the Duane All- man Anthology album in the early seventies. Talton’s equally beautiful “Pretty Friend” is another Cowboy classic that sounds as fresh now as it did when I first heard it. So nice. Boyer sings “All My Friends,” one of his
songs that was recorded by the late great Gregg Allman. So hard to believe Scott is gone now too. Life truly is fleeting. But he sure left behind some great music. Talton sings “5’ll Getcha Ten” as well as
“Hard Drivin’ Man,” a tune this writer actu- ally recorded not so long ago, penned by Tal- ton with the late Johnny Wyker and Tommy Compton. A fun song to wrap up a great live show by the massively talented Boyer and Talton.
-Michael Buffalo Smith
Sugar Brown It’s a Blues World (Calling All Blues) (Sugar Brown) Ken
Kawashima, a fi- nalist in the 2017 International Blues Challenge in
Memphis, Tennessee, grew up in Ohio, stud- ied in Chicago, got his PhD from New York University, and now lives in Toronto. There he teaches East Asian Studies at the Univer- sity of Toronto and plays the blues. While in the Windy City, where his musical path was shaped, Kawashima was given his nickname Sugar Brown by Chicago bluesman Tail Drag- ger Jones. It’s a Blues World (Calling All Blues),
Sugar Brown’s third album glows with au- thenticity. Each of its thirteen original songs has a sense of stewardship and timelessness. Joining Sugar Brown on the studio for this album is special guest and blues guitarist Rockin’ Johnny Burgin, a close friend of Brown’s who was instrumental in inspiring him to play blues guitar. The rest of the band is comprised of Michelle Josef (drums), Russ Boswell (upright bass, electric bass), Nichol Robertson (guitar,banjo), Julian Fauth (piano,Farfisa), Julia Narveson (horns and fiddle), Chuck Bucket (drums), and Bill Howard (tambourine, bass drum). Sugar Brown shares a lesson on the
topic of economics, as he sings about every- one scrambling for the same “Lousy Dime”. Robertson’s infectious banjo riff rolls throughout this wonderful song. Accompa- nied by an exquisite fiddle accompaniment and a beautifully executed piano backing, it’s absolutely flawless. With a Tom Waits-like gusto, Brown suavely sings “What I Know”. The song sweetly rolls in with a horn and harp intro and is threaded with gobs of mar- velously twangy guitar. A North Mississippi blues approach is taken with “Out of the Fry- ing Pan“, an intoxicating tune about having nowhere else to go. The circulating rhythm lures me quickly in, and holds me captive for the remainder of the song. It’s terrific. The retrospective makeover he applies
to his music, using vintage technology, encap- sulates his work in an era of bygone times, giving it a unique sound. That’s half the at- traction to this album. The other half is Sugar Brown’s exemplary songwriting. This album comes highly recommended for Blues enthusiasts.
-Phillip Smith
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