Size: 70,6 MB
Time: 30:25
File: MP3 @ 320K/s
Released: 2025
Styles: Blues/Roots
Art: Front
1. Going Away (4:08)
2. I'm Gonna Change (3:37)
3. I've Been Worried (4:24)
4. Mistreating People (3:29)
5. Hard Times (3:21)
6. Catfish (3:44)
7. Slow Down (4:49)
8. Tell Me (2:50)
While there are more than a few breeding grounds for genre seeds, Mississippi’s Hill Country and beyond may be the most fertile. Promising durability in these efforts and in long-term career potential as well, these releases remind us that while the style and structure of blues may vary, the music is a never-ending alchemical process: a metamorphosis of the agony, ecstasy and humor intrinsic to the sound and style becomes transformed into a potent tonic. No genuine practitioner of the blues will pretend to own its method of expression, but only pass on his particular knowledge when the time is right and that is exactly the rite(s) of passage in action here.
Given that, Ryan Lee Crosby and company inhabit the same space that once saw blues icon Skip James perform in his own inimitable style, it is little wonder the musicians simultaneously hypnotize and instill fear as they play “Going Away” and “I’m Gonna Change.” But by the time the bandleader begins to pick the slightly more tuneful changes on his open-tuned twelve-string electric guitar, the mood changes to one of forthright, resolute optimism. It is no accident either that cut introduces percussionist Grant Smith to the mix: the insistent beats he generates are the ideal foil for the breezy sounds of Jay Scheffler’s harmonica.
With “honored guest” Jimmy “Duck” Holmes on guitar and vocals for half this thirty-minute duration - four tracks including “Hard Times” and “Slow Down” - he might well have received equal billing here. But the credit as applied on the back cover is in keeping with his deference in helping apprentice Crosby learn, then configure his own style of playing. While this judiciously-overdubbed collection may come across as a bit too one-colored, At The Blue Front is the sound of the torch being passed, confidently and surely. /Philadelphia Jazz Experience
Given that, Ryan Lee Crosby and company inhabit the same space that once saw blues icon Skip James perform in his own inimitable style, it is little wonder the musicians simultaneously hypnotize and instill fear as they play “Going Away” and “I’m Gonna Change.” But by the time the bandleader begins to pick the slightly more tuneful changes on his open-tuned twelve-string electric guitar, the mood changes to one of forthright, resolute optimism. It is no accident either that cut introduces percussionist Grant Smith to the mix: the insistent beats he generates are the ideal foil for the breezy sounds of Jay Scheffler’s harmonica.
With “honored guest” Jimmy “Duck” Holmes on guitar and vocals for half this thirty-minute duration - four tracks including “Hard Times” and “Slow Down” - he might well have received equal billing here. But the credit as applied on the back cover is in keeping with his deference in helping apprentice Crosby learn, then configure his own style of playing. While this judiciously-overdubbed collection may come across as a bit too one-colored, At The Blue Front is the sound of the torch being passed, confidently and surely. /Philadelphia Jazz Experience
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