While he's best known as guitarist Brownie McGhee's longtime partner, harmonica ace and vocalist Sonny Terry made many excellent recordings as a solo act, and also recorded with Blind Boy Fuller and others. The 17 songs on this anthology include Terry playing with McGhee's brother Sticks, Pete Seeger, and others, as well as several featuring Terry's biting harmonica and wry leads relating stories of failure, triumph, and resiliency, backed by McGhee's flickering but always audible guitar. The title is a bit misleading, since the earliest date for any session is 1946 (one number), and most are done between 1955 and 1959.

In a way, this is the veteran duo's version of Fathers and Sons, a meeting of old black bluesmen with young white admirers that Muddy Waters and Otis Spann cut with Mike Bloomfield and Paul Butterfield. John Mayall and John Hammond, Jr. are among the "youngsters" on this powerful statement that includes a definitive version of Randy Newman's wickedly subtle anti-slavery tune "Sail Away." Sonny Terry's trademark whoops are energizing. The repartee between him and Brownie McGhee might convince you they were fast friends if you didn't know otherwise.

This record was originally released in 1991 after Taj had taken a break for a number of side projects including children's records. He was obviously refreshed - the record is full of new ideas and incorporates new production techniques, check out the lovely song "Every wind in the river" and also the scratching and rap stylings of "Squat that rabbit". A bit radical for blues but both work very well. Taj revists the song "Giant step" and also takes the traditional blues "Blues with a feeling" to New Orleans, with an added dash of steel guitar (!?!). Guests include banjo player David Johnson, guitarist David Lindley, Andy Kravitz and Bill Summers and the backing band sound great throughout. This is a really good, imaginative record that saw Taj coming back to form and his next couple of records in the 90s were even better.

Señor Blues is one of Taj Mahal's best latter-day albums, a rollicking journey through classic blues styles performed with contemporary energy and flair. There's everything from country-blues to jazzy uptown blues on Señor Blues, and Taj hits all of areas in between, including R&B and soul. Stylistically, it's similar to most of his albums, but he's rarely been as effortlessly fun and infectious as he is here.

Sonny's Story is an excellent showcase for Sonny Terry's talents, which sometimes went unheralded because they largely were showcased in the shadow of Brownie McGhee. Here, Terry is largely playing solo acoustic, with J.C. Burris joining in for harmonica duets every so often; Sticks McGhee and drummer Belton Evans also play on a few cuts. Unlike some solo acoustic blues albums, Sonny's Story is positively infectious. It's hard not to get caught up in Terry's shouts and boogies, and that's one major reason why this is among his best solo recordings.

This 1996 album picks up where Dancing the Blues left off three years earlier, with producer John Porter and most of the same studio cast. There's more of a New Orleans flavor this time, with barrelhouse pianist Jon Cleary contributing a couple of originals to go with such classics as Jesse Hill's "Ooh Poo Pah Doo" and Fats Domino's "Let the Four Winds Blow." Bonnie Raitt and a full vocal chorus help kick "I Need Your Loving" into overdrive. Mahal's one original is the tender, acoustic country-sounding "Lovin' in My Baby's Eyes".

Johnny Shines was far from predictable. Though he recorded his share of inspired electric dates, he had no problem turning around and delivering a stripped-down, all-acoustic Delta blues session like Too Wet to Plow. Recorded in Edmonton, Canada in 1975, Too Wet to Plow finds Shines in excellent form. His solid accompaniment includes harmonica player Sugar Blue and bassist Ron Rault, as well as guitarist/singer Louisiana Red (a superb bluesman who isn't nearly as well known as he should be), and Shines clearly has a strong rapport with them on "Red Sun," "Traveling Back Home," and other highly personal originals. Although Shines' own songs are dominant, one of the album's high points is an interpretation of Robert Johnson's "Hot Tamale."

Travellin' Tracks is a great collection of lively blues by slide guitar specialist Roy Rogers and harmonica wiz Norton Buffalo. Of the 11 songs recorded 5 are live recordings with Mercury Blues; Down In Mississippi; and Move On Way From Here recorded from The Sierra Nevada Taproom in Chico, CA (Love the Sierra Nevada Pale Ale too).
The song Hey There Grandpa is an appropriate change of pace mellow one otherwise Travellin' Tracks is all fast and fun and cool blues with a hip country tinge.

This is one of several albums this artist made in the early '70s that stand as a masterpiece of the acoustic country blues genre. Johnny Shines had begun recording in the mid-'60s, the albums done with electric guitar and full-combo backup, one of them reportedly cut after he hadn't picked up an instrument in years. It was as if he reinvented himself in the following decade, playing pristine and flawless acoustic slide guitar pieces complete with shuffling, stuttering, and stimulatingly complicated tempos. The message was that he had been a young sidekick to Robert Johnson and had absorbed everything, although no deal had been made with the Devil. Shines was a steady, dependable, religious, and forthright chap who lived in Tuscaloosa, AL, and held down a steady job as a construction foreman…

Fourteen rarities from the seemingly bottomless 1948-1952 stash of Detroit producer Bernie Besman, joined by a 1961 stereo "Blues for Abraham Lincoln" that's painfully out-of-tune. Includes "Boogie Chillen" and an alternate version of "I'm in the Mood."

The seventh album from Charley Crockett is perhaps even more potent proof of his literal heartbreak than the scar on his chest. After undergoing open heart surgery that saved his life, Charley says he considered calming down for “just a minute” but once he recovered he did just the opposite. He states boldly with one eyebrow raised, “I wanted to make an album that would change the entire conversation about country music.” That album is Welcome to Hard Times, an aptly-named collection that perfectly fits these troubled days even though it was made just before the pandemic hit. The music was shaped by his heart issues and producer Mark Neill’s desire to make “a dark gothic country record.” Charley certainly knew how to deliver that.

Big Bill Broonzy was viewed as a beloved country blues player when he died in 1958, a master of raw and authentic-sounding folk-blues. But this public image, although Broonzy worked hard to maintain it in his later years, does him a bit of a disservice. He was much more than a rustic relic, however well he played the part. Broonzy was an excellent and even sophisticated guitarist, starting out in the '30s as a rag and hokum player but he was versatile enough to work with jazz and R&B combos, and his guitar approach was instrumental in the early formation of the Chicago blues sound. He was also a crafty songwriter, who managed to write blues pieces that bridged the line between traditional blues themes and modern structure. This 21-track collection focuses mostly on his early solo acoustic material, although there are some band pieces included as well toward the end of the sequence.

This album is one of the cornerstones of Riverside Records' "Original Blues Classics" series. Regardless of the moniker, these sides loom large in the available works of seminal blues icons Pink Anderson and Rev. Gary Davis. Both performers hail from the largely underappreciated Piedmont blues scene - which first began to flourish in the late 19th and early 20th centuries - near the North/South Carolina state border. Anderson's seven tracks were recorded in Charlottesville, VA, on May 29, 1950 - while he was literally on the road. His highly sophisticated and self-accompanied style of simultaneously picking and sliding - accomplished using a half-opened jackknife - could pass for an electronic effect…

Taj's Blues is an entertainingly diverse record, featuring a variety of blues and roots-music styles, all fused together into a distinctive sound of its own. Half of the album is played on acoustic, the other with an electric band (which includes guitarists Ry Cooder and Jesse Davis on a handful of tracks), which gives a pretty good impression of the range of Mahal's talents. It's a good collection, featuring many of his best performances for Columbia, including "Statesboro Blues" and "Leaving Trunk," as well as the unreleased "East Bay Woman".