Terry Evans - 2 albums: Live Like A Hurricane / Anthology

Album: Live Like A Hurricane
Bitrate: 320K/s
Time: 63:52
Size: 146.2 MB
Styles: R&B, Soul-blues vocals
Year: 2003
Art: Front

[4:54] 1. I Fancy You
[5:58] 2. Rooftop Tomcat
[5:58] 3. Honey Boy
[6:45] 4. At The Dark End Of The Street
[6:00] 5. Bald Head
[5:05] 6. Natcha Bone Lover
[4:58] 7. Just A Little Bit
[8:18] 8. Come To The River
[5:11] 9. In This Day And Time
[6:17] 10. One Way Ticket To Memphis
[4:24] 11. Put The Money In Your Pocket

Terry Evans takes us down to the river in this 11-song, hour-plus live performance recorded with few or no overdubs in what seems to be an intimate club. He's in fine gutsy voice throughout, ripping into a selection of his most potent gospel-laced Southern R&B with a tight band in front of an enthusiastic audience. Even though the sound is full and professionally recorded, the near mono reproduction on the majority of the album has a disturbing lack of separation between the instruments. Regardless, Evans is animated, whooping and hollering with obvious passion and the band plays with conviction. When he tears into standards like a nearly seven-minute "Dark End of the Street" and "Just a Little Bit" (the latter with a particularly cheesy synth solo replicating the M.I.A. horns) he makes these classics his own.

The extended, virtually spoken intro to "Come to the River" where Evans reminisces about his childhood years probably worked well on-stage, but it's not something you'll want to hear more than once. When the funky gospel chorus kicks in though, all is forgiven. The upbeat swamp rock of Jorge Calderon's "One Way Ticket to Memphis" is perfect for Evans' gutsy voice, but the synth horn parts are cheap and nearly sink the tune until Jesse Samsel's slide guitar solo redeems the track. Ry Cooder's rocking "Bald Head" sizzles as does the jungle Bo Diddley beat of Evans' own "Honey Boy," making this a worthy document of the vocalist's barnstorming and down-home live show. ~Hal Horowitz

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Album: Anthology
Bitrate: 320K/s
Time: 51:03
Size: 116.9 MB
Styles: R&B, Soul-blues vocals
Year: 2011
Art: Front

[4:48] 1. Let Me Go Back To The Country
[4:35] 2. Natcha Bone Lover
[4:52] 3. Honey Boy
[5:44] 4. Let Love Begin
[4:48] 5. Credit Card Blues
[4:55] 6. Come To The River
[4:30] 7. Shakespere Didn't Quote That
[7:11] 8. What About Me
[4:01] 9. I Fancy You
[5:34] 10. I Wanna Be Close To You God

Terry Evans eventually became a soulful, gospel-flavored vocalist fronting a band, but his career took many steps to reach that pinnacle. Like many blues artists, his first exposure to music was in church, where he sang in the junior choir. As is often the case, his parents allowed him to sing only gospel, but on the sneak, he listened to blues artists such as Elmore James, Little Walter, Albert King, and B.B. King.

His first break was as a member of a Southern vocal group, the Knights. From there, he moved to Southern California and began picking up guitar and writing songs. Among the songs he wrote were "Love Is a Precious Thing," which was recorded by Pops Staples, and "Hop, Skip, and Jump," recorded by Louis Jordan. In the '70s, he performed as a duo with Bobby King on the chitlin circuit, playing their brand of Stax-styled soul and gospel. A hard-working performer, Evans continued with King while at the same time working as a background vocalist for Ry Cooder, both on Cooder's albums and in his touring band. Evans' breakthrough came during the movie Crossroads, where he sang lead on "Down in Mississippi" and the title piece.

In 1993, Evans released his first solo album, Blues for Thought, on Pointblank. While providing backing vocal tracks for Lloyd Jones' Trouble Monkey, he attracted the attention of record producer Joe Harley, who then signed Evans to Audioquest. Evans recorded two fine albums with Harley, Puttin' It Down and Come to the River. Walk That Walk followed in early 2000; Mississippi Magic was issued a year later. ~bio by Char Ham

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