Different Shades of Blue Review (Page 6 of 6)

I’ve listened to DSOB a lot just recently and I have to say that I like it... I just don’t really love it in the way that I love, say, Blues Deluxe, You & Me or John Henry. For me, John Henry was probably Joe’s last real killer guitar album (others may disagree).

I thought Dust Bowl had some great guitar tracks (Last Matador, etc.) mixed with some pretty ordinary stuff (Tennessee Plates, Dust Bowl, Sweet Rowena) and marked the start of a steady movement away from ‘great guitar songs’ to ‘great songs featuring guitars’. Black Rock, DTTD and DSOB are all fine, enjoyable albums that I like to listen to and have some great songs on them (Athens to Athens, Driving Towards the Daylight, Dislocated Boy, Different Shades of Blue, So What Would I Do). But these tend to be songs that suit being played acoustically, rather than electrically.

These three albums have probably done a lot to widen Joe’s appeal but, for me, haven’t really produced any killer guitar tracks that stand shoulder to shoulder with some of his earlier work or which have earned a ‘must play live’ status. I watched the video of Joe playing Oh Beautiful and Midnight Blues on French TV and honestly felt that Oh Beautiful really only HINTED at what Joe is capable of as a guitarist and singer, while Midnight Blues DEMONSTRATED what he is capable of.  By the same token, when people ask which of Joe’s albums are a great introduction to his music or should be recommended to friends, Forum members almost invariably opt of RAH 1 or LFNIP, not the recent studio albums.

I remember as a kid being disappointed with Clapton’s 461 Ocean Boulevard album because it paled into insignificance as a guitar album alongside, say, Rory Gallagher’s Irish Tour ’74, which was released around the same time and a lot of us pretty much stopped listening to Clapton at that point. By going for a more 'popular' sound, Clapton went on of course to be incredibly successful, but I’m not sure he ever lived up to his reputation as one of the guitar greats from that point on. His real guitar legacy really remains rooted in his work of the late 60s and very early 70s.

I can understand why Joe doesn’t necessarily want to live in the past and wants to reach a wider audience and try different things, but as a fan of his I’m still keeping my fingers crossed that the next album will be a step in the direction of something a bit more ‘Beano’ and not another step in the direction of ‘Tears in Heaven’, if you know what I mean...

Music is such a subjective thing and this is just my personal opinion. Ask 100 other people and you may get 100 completely different opinions.

A shout out for a song on DTTD that rarely seems to get mention in terms of awesome electric guitar solos - specifically the solo in Heavenly Soul.  Absolutely awesome guitar work on that track IMHO.

Yes, perhaps it's more of a "great song featuring guitar" vs. a "great guitar song," but it's an incredible solo nonetheless.