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(www.rustyends.com)

Leroux One of Those Days Own Label

“Louisiana’s LeRoux” as the sleeve has it, though you might well
guess their southern background as soon as the opening guitar
riff kicks in on the title track - we are firmly in southern rock
territory here. In fact, if you appreciate the likes of The Allman
Brothers and their off-shoots, there's no need to read any
further - just go and buy!

Those who need a bit more information though should note the
band arose from a local outfit that had backed Clifton Chenier
and Gatemouth Brown, but that this currently eight-piece band first hit big with their debut
album in 1978, and after a ten-year interval, they are now back with this, their seventh album. It
even contains a remake of their anthemic ‘New Orleans Ladies’, a regional hit, and this version

also has guest guitarist Tab Benoit taking the guitar break. The band have worked with Tab
many times before.

OK, so a lot of this album leans more towards rock (or blues-rock), but certainly with a strong
tinge of the Pelican State. Note particularly ‘Lucy Anna’ - sung with rich harmonies and with a
fine second-line rhythm and pianist Rod Roddy showing he knows more than a thing or two about
Crescent City piano traditions. ‘After All’ is a blues southern soul flavoured ballad, and the

instrumental ‘Sauce Piquante’ is akin to The Meters playing the blues - yes I was impressed.

This is a set with a lot of the good-time feel associated with Louisiana. If you don’t have a smile
on your face when it starts, you certainly will by the end.

Norman Darwen
(www.leroux.band)

Gravel & Grace Bringing the Blues Ava Grace Music

Big Earl Matthews is a singer with 20 plus years of singing the
blues; Singer/ pianist Ava Grace wasn’t even born then.

However, the two work well together, and generally the two
singers alternate the songs, each supporting the other.

Ava obviously has a youthful turn of mind - try ‘Pennies’ which I
could imagine as a contemporary chart number, but in some

places she shows a strong Etta James influence on her musical
approach and her vocals; take a listen to the southern soul
styled ‘Love On The Brain’ (actually a Rihanna song) or the funky modern blues of the opening
‘Scares Me’. Oddly, it is Earl who strays further away from the the blues on items like ‘Next
Move’, with its distant echoes of Bob Dylan’s ‘Like A Rolling Stone’, the country-ish ‘When I’m
Hungover’’, or the smooth soul of ‘Wash My Blues’. Mind you, he definitely takes it to church on