Recorded in Beaver Creek Brewery in Wilbaux, Montana, this CD finds Maryland-born, Los Angeles based, bluesman Dennis drawing on his previous five albums for his material, before he signs off with a storming version of the Albert King classic ‘Born Under A Bad Sign’. Dennis has a strong, muscular approach both to his vocals and guitar playing, and his rhythm section of bass player and backing vocalist Sam Correa and drummer Raymond Johnson provides just the kind of backing this music needs – though Jones’ music is in no way one-dimensional. The band eases into the show, and the intensity racks up a little, appropriately enough, when Dennis reaches track three, ‘Passion For The Blues’, and this energetic approach, with some Hendrix-y type of playing, continues up to the jazzily swinging shuffle of ‘Super Deluxe’, the lyrically pointed ‘Enjoy The Ride’ with its touch of funk to its blues and ‘You Don’t Know A Thing About Love’, with Latin touches on a relatively relaxed number. There’s a low-down and dirty tint to the grinding anti-drugs track, ‘Kill The Pain’, ‘Big Black Cat’ is a no-nonsense blues, ‘Devil’s Nightmare’ has a tough sound, and ‘I’m Good’ is another fine shuffle, before Dennis turns his hand to Albert King’s aforementioned classic and mashes it up with Jimi Hendrix’s ‘Voodoo Chile’. “Blues you can rock to” is the strap-line on Dennis’s website and that’s the truth!
Norman Darwen