Kenny
Wayne Shepherd is one of the best guitarists of his generation, and his
vocalist, Noah Hunt has a quintessential “blues voice”. Because of this, any album that the two put
out is required listening. The fact that
Goin’ Home is just fifteen blues cover
songs and no original material doesn’t really hurt this as much as you would
expect. The band masterfully recreates
the songs by such blues contemporaries as Muddy Waters, Stevie Ray Vaughn and
BB King.
Not
only does the band perform admirably, they also bring in guest musicians to
work with them including Robert Randolph, and one of my personal favorites
Warren Haynes. “Breaking Up Somebody’s
Home”, the song with Haynes, is by far the standout on the entire album. The interplay between Shephard and Haynes on
the guitar and Hunt and Haynes with the vocals is incredible, enough to make me
wish that these artists would collaborate more.
An entire album from this particular pairing would be the standout blues
album of the year, if not the decade.
The
musicianship is exactly what you would expect out of this group, with
Shepherd’s guitar work being a particular highlight (as expected). Hunt’s vocals on the classic blues tunes give
them a more modern feel while keeping with the original spirit of the
songs. Beyond that, there is not much
more to say. For an album that was
thrown together because the band apparently had an eleven day break in their
touring schedule it comes through as polished as an album that took years to
complete. This is a great album to add
to your Kenny Wayne Shepherd collection, or to a basic blues playlist as it has
everything you could want. Hopefully
within the next year or so we get some more original music from this band, as
well as hopefully that collaboration with Warren Haynes I mentioned earlier.
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