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this version works, although it does have nice organ and a blistering lead guitar solo. I wasn’t
expecting much from this record for some reason but I was pleasantly surprised, for a debut
album it is amazing with the band’s own songs fitting in perfectly beside the more famous covers
and both the band’s playing and Jennifer’s vocals are also very good – obviously honed by playing
live. It will be interesting to see what they can produce when they go into a studio.

Graham Harrison
Katarina Pejak—Pearls on a String—Ruf Records ASIN ‏:
B0CTWTJG18

This is the second album on Ruf Records from Belgian singer
and keyboard player Katarina Pejak, it was recorded in France
with her husband Romain Guillot producing and engineering.
We begin with the title track a relaxed and very catchy song with
her small band of Boris Rosenfeld (guitar, pedal steel), Sylvain
Didou (bass) and Johan Barrer (drums) augmented with guest
Laura Chavez on guitar. ‘Jeremy’s Boat’ and ‘Woman’ are both
jazzy with the latter having guest Dana Colley on sax, ‘It Only
Takes a Song’ is also jazzy but Rosenfeld’s pedal steel adds an
atmospheric country edge. The lyrics of songs like ‘Jeremy’s
Boat’, ‘Notes on Boredom’ and ‘Slow Explosion’ have a distinctly ‘continental’ feel to them –
left-field and distinctly different to American or British lyrics.

The piano on ‘Excuses’ reminded me of Nina Simone’s ‘I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel To Be
Free’ and the pedal steel is back for ‘Witness’, while the laid back ‘Sunglasses’ has the feel of a
Larna Del Ray song. ‘Too Late’ is a beautiful, lilting ballad with more melodic pedal steel and
‘Slow Explosion’ is very quirky, a bit like a Kurt Weill song. As well as Katarina’s own songs we
also get two covers, a very jazzy reading of Pink Floyd’s ‘Money’ which surprised me by working
really well, with its subtle skipping drums and double bass, and also the Wood Brothers’ ‘Honey
Jar’, again it sounds fine as Katarina works a similar territory to the American band with elements
of both jazz and country. I didn’t know what to expect from this album but I really enjoyed it
and found it very accessible, she has a very individual style, she sounds vulnerable but also
completely in charge and the band and guests support her perfectly.

Graham Harrison
Quique Gomez & Little Charlie Baty—Cookin’ at Greaseland
—Gulf Coast Records ASIN ‏: ‎B0CY8PBWXS

I’m a big fan of multi-instrumentalist Kid Andersen and the
music he produces in his Greaseland studio and the latest record
to emerge from there is this collaboration between Spanish
harmonica player Quique Gomez and the late Little Charlie Baty,
the original guitarist with The Night Cats. The pair met on
shared bills and became friends and cut the album at Greaseland
in 2019 with Quique on vocals and harp and Charlie on guitar,
with Alexander Pettersen (drums) and Kid on everything else.
We begin with Wynonie Harris’s jump blues ‘Bloodshot Eyes’
with Charlie cutting loose on guitar and some lovely piano.
‘Thirstiest Man in Town’ is a slab of hard-hitting blues with
Quique and Charlie trading licks and the rhythm section powering along behind. ‘I Believe in
Music’ is an almost pop-sounding song, catchy and melodic but Chet Baker’s ‘It Could Happen
to You’ is very jazzy, laid back with Baty’s skipping guitar and a swinging rhythm section of
double bass and brushed drums and with Quique taking Baker’s trumpet part on harp.

‘Jack You’re Dead’ and the old jazz standard ‘Tangerine’ continue the jazzy sounds but with
Walter Horton’s ‘So Crazy About You Baby’ we’re back to the blues with Quique wailing on harp.