Some blues on the bus this morning. We're not talking Blind Lemon Jefferson or B.B. King here. This is British Blues (think Yardbirds, Led Zeppelin, Cream, Peter Green's Fleetwood Mac) which means it's heavily riff-laden, and nobody is talking about how they've been down since their lady left them. In many ways British Blues was the forerunner of what later became "Heavy Rock" (Deep Purple et al) and you can certainly hear it in this album. Dominated by Stan Webb's solid guitar-work, every track is absolutely dripping with solos. If you like your blues powerful and rockin', or if you like your rock loud and bluesy, you'll like this album. I suspect I will be playing it on the way home as well today.
This is actually Chicken Shack's 5th album (they formed in 1968), and is probably not representative of the rest of their discography, so I'll be wary of listening to any of their other albums. In a Spinal Tap-esque way they've been through several lineup changes over the years and a list of past & future members reads like a roll-call of the British blues and rock elite. Both Bob Daisley (bass player with Ozzy Osbourne) and Tony Ashton (keyboardist with Paice, Ashton, Lord) have played with Chicken Shack, as did drummers Keef Hartley and Alan Powell (later of Hawkwind) In fact prior to this very album the bass player, keyboardist and drummer all left to join another Blues outfit, Savoy Brown (the keyboardist in question being Paul Raymond, later of UFO).
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