South Shores Tavern (Lake Worth, FL)

 

 

 

 

What is the “new eclectic blues movement? It’s almost easier to describe what it is not. Most people who are not avid blues fans often think of B.B. King, the Blues Brothers or perhaps Stevie Ray Vaughn when someone mentions the blues – and this is not the “new eclectic blues movement” – this is simply great, but standard blues fare.

However, take a batch of music from Charley Patton, Son House, Robert Johnson, Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf, John Lee Hooker, Sonny Boy Williamson, Willie Dixon, Albert King, James Brown, John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Dr. John, Curtis Salgado and Taj Mahal, cook it over a low heat until it simmers into a tasty blend. Season it up with hip, tight arrangements and extended opportunities for improvisation, pour it like gravy over veteran musicians who grew up together mixing their Texas, New Orleans, Detroit and Miami heritages, and you end up with something that typifies the “new eclectic blues movement”. It’s innovative and original, yet its based on America’s musical form that others have worn thin. It’s different from anything you’ve heard before today, yet you know it’s the blues. It spans across territory from the acoustic sensibility and raw howl of pre-war delta blues to the electrified performances of the Chicago blues era and beyond. It soaks up the performance dynamism of soul and gospel tent revivals, then it wraps it in the subtlety of bebop and serves it with reverence for the great fathers of the blues. Oh yes, and it all comes with a big sidecar just dripping in joyous jams.