| By
Cornbread
 Otis
Taylor – Below The Fold
{August 23, 2005 | Telarc}
WC
Handy Award winner and alternative bluesman
Otis Taylor will release his seventh CD in the
Summer 2005. Below The Fold combines 10-tracks
that are fairly diverse and combine traditional
Delta blues with Appalachian country blues.
Taylor serves up a multi instrument gumbo with
fiddle, organ, banjo, mandolin, cello, and trumpet
with guitar, harmonica, bass and drums. As an
added bonus and for the first time, Taylor employs
drums on several tracks.
1. Feels Like Lighting –
this song is banjo and bass with backing chant-like
vocals.
2. Boy Plays Mandolin –
a song about mandolin with talking vocals and
horns, kinda a unique combination with a fast
bass line.
3. Hookers In The Street –
fast music/slow vocals. As a blues aficionado
I found the guitar particularly pleasing.
4. Mama’s Got A Friend
– it ain’t Motown but in a way this
song kinda reminded of “Papa Was A Rolling
Stone” by the Temps. Bits and pieces of
horn throughout.
5. Working For The Pullman Company
– features Taylor's teenage daughter Cassie,
who wrote the melody and chorus, when she was
just five years old (she plays bass too).
6. Your Children Sleep Good Tonight
– vocally Otis at his best.
7. Didn’t Know Much About Education
– Chicago blues guitar and John Lee Hooker
like vocals. Very nice.
8. Went To Hermes – very
traditional acoustic blues, my favorite track.
9. Government Lied –
much like the others although on this song I
thought the music and lyrics didn’t really
go together.
10. Right Side Of Heaven –
is reminiscent of a New Orleans-style Cajun
marching band.
Visit
Otis on the web at www.otistaylor.com
and catch his performance in St. Louis on Friday,
August 19, 2005 at the St. Louis Art Museum.
Below The Fold is unique and far from traditional.
If you want something different from the norm
and have a hankerin’ for this style of
blues, you’ll like this recording. Listen
to it, then come back to it later and it sounds
different each time.
 Ciao'
for now, peace.
Peter 'Cornbread'
Cohen, CBP
~
Cornbread@STLBlues.net ~
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