Is Willie Dixon the most important human being to have ever pressed a fret? There’s a good case for it.
Without the blues legend, there’d be a gaping chasm splitting the good from the bad, leaving the great poetic minds to come without a call to arms.
Chris Russell’s call has been taken with both hands, wrenching the dirge of electric mud from his brightened Danelectro.
Having sat on bar room stages, lonely and unrewarded for too long, Russell and his wife decided to embark on what would be an annual pilgrimage to the Deep South. An education like no other from the wise ears of the fabled Juke Joints was just the boost he needed.
Returning to Melbourne and finding an equally versed soul in sometime Cosmic Psychos drummer Dean Muller, the output has been staggering.
Finally there’s an album, littered with a measured blend of Delta blues staples and sneering new tales. It echoes from a cover of Dixon’s “Evil” through soaring slides and the Bo Diddly beat.
Russell’s baritone lungs stretch the view back to simpler times, hollering loud and low as the mould is set strong. The kind overdubs suit the music staggeringly well where the lost art of the handclap only sharpens the listen.
If there was a time before to do the walk, the time is here again.
