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Candice Ivory—New Southern Vintage—Nola Blue Rec-
ords ASIN : B0FBMRMY34

Candice’s last album was a tribute to Memphis Minnie and this
one is apparently a celebration of blues inspired by the American
South. She’s backed by her road band The Blue Bloods – Robert
Allen Parker and Adam Hill (guitars), Khari Wynn (bass) and
Donald Johnson (drums), with Cincinnati’s Ben Levin adding his
piano to most tracks and the Swiss harmonica player Jan
Hartmann also sitting in on the first four tracks. ‘Ain’t So Blind’,
‘Blue Blood’ and ‘I’m in Trouble’ are three tough, driving band
songs to start us off, while ‘Foolish Pleasure’ slows things down
with Kenyan vocalist Yubu Kazungu joining Candice on vocals.
‘Looking for My Baby’ ups the pace again with Ben Levin’s piano being to the fore and ‘Strong
Black Mattie’ is an update on the traditional much-covered song and features Chris Stephenson
on organ.

Ecuadorian guitarist Antonio Vergara plays on the moody ‘Let Your Love Shine On’, while on
‘Catfish Blues’ Jimmy ‘Duck’ Holmes plays guitar and sings with Candice, over Ben’s rolling piano,
with harmonica from Memphis’s young Damian Pearson and on ‘Crown Royal Bag Blues’ Candice
and Ben are joined by Japanese guitarist Takuto Asano. The album finishes with Candice singing
two authentic-sounding Memphis Minnie songs – ‘World of Trouble’ with Ben on piano and
David Evans on guitar and ‘Shout the Boogie’ where they are joined by guitarist Andy Cohen.
This is a solid blues album but one which has lots of variety from the many guests, with the
international artists giving different ‘colours’ than you would normally expect. Candice’s voice
is strong throughout, as always Ben Levin’s piano playing is excellent and the tracks featuring
the band are strong.

Graham Harrison

Bywater Call—Sign of Peace—Bywater Call

You’d have to compare Toronto’s Bywater Call with the Tedeschi
Trucks Band to give a flavour of what they sound like—both have
powerful female vocalists, in this case Meghan Parnell; virtuoso
guitarists—Dave Barnes; brass sections—Stephen Dyte and
Julian Nalli; and driving rhythm sections—John Kervin
(keyboards), Mike Meusel (bass) and Bruce McCarthy (drums).
Looking at the track listing of this their latest live album you’d
be forgiven for thinking it was an EP as it only has six tracks but
it has a playing time of 46 minutes, with two tracks each being
around 10 minutes long. Performances come from live shows in
Canada, Woodstock USA and Newbury UK.

We blast off with ‘Sunshine’ a funky number with Meghan’s strident vocals and a sax solo from
Nalli, while ‘Bring Me Down’ from their 2019 debut release starts in subdued fashion with
haunting slide guitar and organ before Meghan’s heartfelt, bluesy vocals come in, it’s a subtle
10-minute track with a slide guitar solo from Barnes towards the end. ‘As If’ is more blasting
funk with fine riffing brass and Meghan out front again and we also get a 10-minute muscular
version of Stephen Stills’ ‘Love the One You’re With’ which develops into jazzy improvisation
with piano and sax before Meghan returns to the song. The title track begins with a solo piano
intro before the band crash in for this New Orleans-style song that doubles in pace towards the
end - phew! We finish with ‘Everybody Knows’ - not the Leonard Cohen song – this is a pounding
soul anthem with the whole band ripping loose – Barnes on guitar, the brass section and
McCarthy’s drums powering everything along. This is a great showcase for the band which sees