These two chart topping blues acts – TajMo and Selwyn – both playing the Palladium

Two new blues albums are topping the charts and getting lots of attention these days. Taj Mahal and Keb Mo have finally gotten together for a album called “TajMo.” And our own Selwyn Birchwood has just released his new Alligator Records album: “Pick Your Poison.”

 

You can see shows by these great artists at the Palladium coming up soon. Selwyn and his band are doing two nights in the Side Door, July 28 and 29. Taj and Keb will be on our main stage on Tuesday, Sept. 26.

 

Tickets are on sale now for both of those shows. Follow this link for Selwyn’s shows. And follow this one for Taj and Keb.

 

Now here’s an excerpt from the Wall Street Journal review of their new records. You can follow this link for the full story.

 

 

By BARRY MAZOR/Wall Street Journal reviewer

The blues territory, almost a century old as a genre and marketing format now, has proved remarkably sturdy—thanks not to prolonged, clichéd taproom renditions of “Sweet Home Chicago,” but to the continuing creativity of musicians making varied, contemporary music within the form. These three albums—all, in a sign of continuing blues-soul fusion, bearing horns in their mix, and released this spring—make the point:

 

• Taj Mahal & Keb’ Mo. “TajMo.” (Concord)

These two are, of course, among the best-known names in bluesy popular music of any stripe, and they’ve now gotten together in this band, TajMo—variously acoustic, electrified and horn-backed—and produced an album as entertaining and adept as their pairing suggests. Produced in Nashville (Keb’ Mo’s adopted home) and introducing new songs written by one or both of them along with such Music City luminaries as Gary Nicholson, Al Anderson and Leslie Satcher, the set explores multiple blues flavors and well beyond.

 

There are amusing, enjoyable turns on Sleepy John Estes’s “Diving Duck Blues” and Piano Red’s “She Knows How to Rock Me,” which you might expect, but also a sincere version of John Mayer’s hopeful “Waiting on the World to Change,” which you might not. The chemistry is strong, not least when they romp through a straight-ahead, bouncy version of the Who’s countrified “Squeeze Box.” Lizz Wright makes a guest vocal appearance on the upbeat, mystical “Om Sweet Om.” Across the moods, Taj Mahal and Keb’ Mo do not let you down.

 

• Selwyn Birchwood. “Pick Your Poison.” (Alligator)

Selwyn Birchwood, 32, from Orlando, Fla., is precisely the sort of skilled, energetic and original artist that blues needs to stay healthy for another century. Winner of both the Blues Foundation’s International Blues Challenge and the Albert King Guitarist of the Year award in 2013, his command was evident on his debut album on the label, “Don’t Call No Ambulance.” This second outing underscores his very evident fluency generating new licks and rhythmic surprises with both Buddy Guy-influenced electric guitar (“Heavy Heart”) and occasional lap steel, and as leader of a tight, practiced band that includes Regi Oliver on baritone, alt and tenor sax and flutes.

 

The songwriting is particularly noteworthy—observant, clever (“My Whiskey Loves My Ex”) and pointed when topical. (“They cut my days and they cut my pay; they even want to cut my hair,” he notes in the very contemporary workingman’s blues “Corporate Drone.”) His voice is smooth; his singing on target whether it’s a finger-pointing protest (“Police State”) or a stricken, jazzy, post-love ballad (“Lost in You”). Expectations have been high for Mr. Birchwood—and he lives up to them here.