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LOOKIN’ FOR TROUBLE
(M.C. RECORDS)
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Don’t judge Kim Wilson by "Tuff Enuff" and the Fabulous Thunderbirds’ other radio hits from their major-label years. Listen, instead, to "Money, Marble & Chalk" from this album, Wilson’s first studio recording in six years. It’s a study in amplified harmonica virtuosity, with a mile-wide tone soaked in the kind of reverb that made Little Walter smile. No wonder former Eric Clapton and Muddy Waters harpman Jerry Portnoy proclaims Wilson the greatest living harmonica master. Wilson is also singing through his amp to give this sweaty love song an otherworldly quality, as if he were a ghost from some long-gone Chicago blues haven. And though that tune is the album’s highlight, he also taps New Orleans swing (Dave Bartholomew’s "Hook, Line and Sinker"), powerhouse shuffles (the title track and more), and prickly Texas blues (his own "Tortured," which features a nifty, needling solo from Worcester’s Troy Gonyea, Wilson’s MVP guitarist) with élan. All of his tunes fit perfectly with the classics he covers. And his closing instrumental tribute to the late Junior Wells, "Jr.’s Jump," balances jazz and juke joints as effortlessly as its namesake did.
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