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Copeland's band). The others in the core band are Tommy Mandel (keyboards); Eric Boyd (bass and
production) and Steve Holley (drums). ‘Say It Out Loud' is a nice Bo Diddley-style song, 'Montanas'
is a sexy a Bossa Nova featuring Kirsten singing in Spanish, with guitars by Raul Midon and John
Benthal, and piano from Cuban born jazz pianist Fabian Almazan and the album closes with a

version of Leon Russell’s 'I’d Rather Be Blind'.

Graham Harrison

Kim Wilson—Take Me Back—M.C. Records ASIN : B08GDK9JRJ
Kim's last album was 2017's excellent 'Blues and Boogie Volume 1'

- sadly a volume 2 never materialised however, he has now moved
back to Mark Carpentieri's M. C. Records and this new album
carries on in a similar style - very authentic sounding Chicago
blues with lots of Kim's world-beating harmonica (and also his
superb vocals). The album was recorded ‘live in the studio’ in

mono at Big Jon Atkinson’s BigTone Studios with its classic
analogue equipment, with Kid Andersen, Atkinson and Rusty Zinn
(guitars), Robert Welsh (keyboards), Jonny Viau (sax), Troy
Sandow (bass), Marty Dodson (drums) and Mr. Andersen also
producing. The songs are a mixture of Wilson originals and classic blues, including four songs from
ex-Muddy Waters sideman Jimmy Rogers - 'The Last Time', 'Money, Marbles and Chalk', 'Goin’ Away
Baby' and 'If It Ain’t Me'.

I've got to say the music does sound great, so authentic - it's hard to believe that this is music
recorded in the 21st. century and Kim's harp tone is just fabulous, really thick, deep and rounded.
However, for me there is always the slight problem of why 70 years later people are still slavishly
trying to recreate that 50s sound and it does give the album a rather samey overall sound. Having

said that I did really like the blistering version of Larry Williams' 'Slow Down' - once a very popular
song with Merseybeat bands - and the cover of Howlin’ Wolf’s 'No Place To Go' is handled very
subtlety and Kim's own song 'Fine Little Woman' and his other original songs fit in just fine with
the blues' classics. There is some wonderful playing here from both Kim and also the band but
personally I would like to hear him trying to take the music forward rather than trying to recreate
the past.

Graham Harrison

William Shatner—The Blues—Cleopatra Records ASIN :
B08DVTZ18X
Over the years William Shatner (Star Trek's Captain Kirk) has
released many albums in many different genres, with the 'joke' on

all of them being that he can't sing and speaks the lyrics in a
dramatic way, as Peter Sellers used to do back in the day. The first
time you hear this it's mildly amusing, the second time it isn't and
the third time it is just plain annoying. I had wondered if this
album was going to be Mr. Shatner saying that he was in fact a
life-long blues fan and he had finally got the chance to perform the

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