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Chris Whitley : War Crime Blues
© Messenger Records 2004
Recorded completely live without overdubs of any kind, Whitley accompanies himself on bottleneck guitar and stomping board. If there were any lingering doubts as to Whitley's abilities as either a brilliant and original songwriter, or as a bona fide American bluesman in the tradition handed down from the American South, this disc should eliminate them for all but the most ignorant.
His tunes, such as "White Rider," "Ghost Dance," "Her Furious Angels," and "Dead Cowboy Song," do not interpret the blues so much as revision them as a living, dangerous, fire-breathing tradition. Whitley's cover of Reed's "I Can't Stand It" is ragged, switchblade rock done on a distorted solo acoustic guitar with organic foot-stomping percussion that shudders through the speakers. The set ends on a haunting note with an a cappella vocal of the jazz standard "Nature Boy," and Whitley surprises us again, this time as an effective, nuanced, interpretive ballad singer. War Crime Blues is the album Whitley fans have been waiting for.
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Chris Whitley : Weed
Acoustic Blues / Folk
Chris Whitley is a master of the National Steel guitar, a difficult instrument that (literally) slides between acoustic and electric blues. It's a description that also fits Whitley the artist, always caught in the distance between styles. Weed is a spacious, dark album, full of understated tension and simmering passions, focused on images of desire, corruption and wanderlust.
Chris Whitley : Dirt Floor
Blues / Folk Rock
Dirt Floor is as musically raw and basic as the title implies. With nine of Whitley's unadorned country blues and ballads ... Whitley has tapped into some deep emotional reserves; in his voice and in his guitar playing are ghostly echoes both of black southern blues and ancient Celtic hill music.