KELLY
JOE PHELPS has been punching through the boundaries of who he is
supposed to be with every album. I first knew him as the religiously
inclined, prodigious country blues guitarist of 1996's Roll Away
The Stone, itself a progression from his jazz beginnings. The three
albums since have thrown up personal, modern blues songwriting, then
a turn into something uncategorisable: literary songs of hurt played
in a tight but improvised spirit by a top notch band. It's a right-angled
career turn typical of two musicians Phelps loves, Miles Davis and
Bob Dylan, and of Phelps' own questing, wrestling approach to musical
and spiritual questions that made even his "purest" blues
more than pastiche.
KELLY
JOE PHELPS has been punching through the boundaries of who he is
supposed to be with every album. I first knew him as the religiously
inclined, prodigious country blues guitarist of 1996's Roll Away
The Stone, itself a progression from his jazz beginnings. The three
albums since have thrown up personal, modern blues songwriting, then
a turn into something uncategorisable: literary songs of hurt played
in a tight but improvised spirit by a top notch band. It's a right-angled
career turn typical of two musicians Phelps loves, Miles Davis and
Bob Dylan, and of Phelps' own questing, wrestling approach to musical
and spiritual questions that made even his "purest" blues
more than pastiche.