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Yates McKendree—Buchanan Lane—Qualified Records

Multi -instrumentalist Yates McKendree is the 21-year old son of
producer, engineer and keyboard player Kevin McKendree and
like his dad he also has experience in the studio as both musician
and engineer for artists of the calibre of Delbert McClinton. We
start with the instrumental ‘The Out Crowd’ with Yates on piano
with an answer record to Ramsey Lewis’ 1965 version of ‘The In
Crowd’, next it’s Yates on guitar for BB King’s ‘Ruby Lee’ and also
an original BB King-style song ‘Wise’ and then its ‘No Justice’ a
slow blues with him playing guitar, organ, bass and drums, as well
as singing! Fletcher Smith’s ‘Brand New Neighbourhood’ is a
rocking jump blues with a brass section of Jim Hoke (saxophones), Andrew Carney (trumpet)
and Roland Barber (trombone) and the brass also feature on T-Bone Walker’s ‘Papa Ain’t Salty’
and also the jazzy ‘No Reason’.

Yates perfectly captures the New Orleans vibe on Dr. John’s ‘Qualified’ which also has the McCrary
Sisters on background vocals and dad Kevin on piano, then it’s Guitar Slim’s blues ‘It Hurts to
Love Someone’. He then is back on the 88’s for a jazzy sophisticated take on Jimmy Binkley’s
‘Wine, Wine, Wine’, followed by Tampa Red’s blues ‘Please Mr. Doctor’ and we finish as we started
with another instrumental the funky ‘Voodoo’ featuring Yates’ guitar and dad’s Hammond organ.
Yates is obviously a ‘triple threat’ in that he can sing, play multiple instruments and knows his
way around a studio but thankfully he does feature other musicians here in the shape of Steve
Mackey and Greg Garner (bass), Big Joe Maher and Kenneth Blevins (drums) as well as his old
man on various keyboards and co-producing for what is an album of authentic-sounding blues
and old-style R&B.

Graham Harrison

Annika Chambers & Paul DesLauriers—Good Trouble—
VizzTone ASIN :B0B9RVT9QH

Annika Chambers is a soul/blues singer from Texas and Paul
DesLauriers is a blues/rock guitarist from Canada and three years
ago they merged their careers and lives when they married and
decided to work together and listening to the powerful opener
‘You’ve Got to Believe’ I’m glad that they did. The album mixes
all the ingredients that they bring as individuals – blues, soul and
rock with a great combination of original songs and covers and
was recorded in drummer Chris Peet’s studio in Florida. After
the two opening originals they cover George Harrison’s ‘Isn’t It a
Pity’ which here becomes a heartfelt soul ballad and ‘Heavy Load’ is a dramatic gospel song
featuring Annika’s powerful voice and Paul’s dobro guitar.

They also do a nice tasteful cover of Joe South's 'Walk A Mile in My Shoes' as well as a great
version of Willie John’s ‘I Need Your Love So Bad’ (also covered by Peter Green’s Fleetwood Mac)
again with the winning combination of Annika’s vocals and Paul’s searing lead guitar. ‘We Got
the Blues’ is a nice, more modern song by Otis Taylor’s daughter Cassie and ‘I’m Going to Live
the Life I Sing About In My Song’ is a slow blues with wah-wah guitar. Baby Washington’s
‘Money’s Funny’ is a fun song about – you guessed it money and ‘Mississippi Queen’ is the old
rock song by Mountain that both Annika and Paul really rock out on and the closer ‘I Need More