Ten Shades of Blue
Artist: Joe Pitts
Label: Kijara
Time: 10 Tracks / 44 minutes

I am starting this review on the back foot, because in the packaging, Pitts tells how he thought about this project from two angles when he started it. The first was as a musician, who had grown up appreciating the British invasion artists like Jimmy Page, Paul Kossoff, Peter Green and Eric Clapton, as well as closer musicians like Duane Allman and Dicky Betts. The second was with regard to the views of music critics, who he thinks will judge this as a covers or tribute project. Those who see it that way will completely miss the point, he tells us. It is actually a ‘Thank You’ project to those influential blues players...

From this writer's point of view, there is not a lot of difference between a tribute and a thank you, but that aside, it is really the music itself that counts, whatever the inspiration. And blues is one genre where covers are often par for the course and hence no problem. 

While we at looking at how to view this disc, I would also add that I don’t see this as ten completely different shades of blues, considering the possibilities (for example, there are no instrumentals, there is no exchanging licks with organ or harp and he only picks up an acoustic for the last two and a half minutes). Rather, they are ten slightly different and very compatible hues. Wordplay aside, they are more like ten different shades of indigo.

Both sides of the Atlantic show their influences here. The sound I most hear from ‘over here’ is John Mayall, particularly in the vocal style, and I sense it more in “Pain in the Streets” as I do in the actual Mayall song, “Walking on Sunset.”

As for his side of the pond, he does a very fine Muddy Waters on “Cross-Eyed Cat” and the other unmistakable old classic is Elmore James’ “I’m Worried” (not that he title matters, didn’t James just keep re-working the same old song with different lyrics?). It is here that he gets to show his slide work, which is one of his strengths, and to put his vocals through a harmonica mic. Pitts covers the funky side of the genre with Albert Collins’ “Put the Shoe on the Other Foot.” 

Like John Mayall or Roy Buchanan, Pitts is a more natural guitarist than he is singer. His singing feels a tad stilted and it is where he is free to solo that he comes across more strongly. He can be very expressive with six strings, and displays his tender side well with his too short solo on “No Stranger to the Blues.” As usual, it is the slower ones that carry the strongest emotional pull and he gets a chance to extend to over seven minutes on Eric Gales’ “Freedom From my Demons.”

Whether it is the shortage of instrumentals or a couple of the song choices, at times he can sound a little down (even for the blues) in a way that takes away from the experience, rather than harnessing the emotion and transferring something visceral to the listener. However, the playing is highly accomplished and there are some fine selections. This is one of the better blues discs that we have had to review in 2010.

Derek Walker