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Brothers is a lazy, organ-led song with a catchy chorus “Honey dripping off your
spoon…”.

I liked the ballad ‘Desiree’ which reminded me of mid-period Bonnie Raitt and ‘Dog
in You’ and ‘Born Yesterday’ are two more Little Feat-style songs with Josh Sklair’s
slide guitar, while ‘The Cure’ was co-written by Paul Barrere and Allison – it’s about
cancer, which killed Paul but Allison’s is thankfully in remission. ‘The Blues is My
Religion’ is a funky stomper driven by Tony Braunagel’s pounding drums (Tony also
produced the album) and ‘I Ain’t Lyin’’ is a poppy Caribbean-flavoured song. This
is a very pleasant album with songs reminiscent of both Little Feat and Bonnie Raitt
and although Allison has a good voice she doesn’t quite have the character or
phrasing of Bonnie.

Graham Harrison

Cristina Vane—Hear My Call—Blue Tip Records

Cristina Vane grew up in Italy, France and then
England, where she learned slide guitar before
moving to America where she worked in McCabe’s
guitar shop in LA, adding fingerpicking and
clawhammer banjo to her skills. Opener ‘Do You
Want to Lose’ also showcases her honeyed vocals
and ‘Coming in Hot’ combines her slide guitar with
double-tracked vocals, while ‘Little Girl from
Nowhere’ is quite poppy and catchy and although
the following ‘Hard Rock Bend’ isn’t actually ‘hard
rock’ it’s also electric rather than acoustic. Molly
Tuttle joins Cristina on guitar for the pure
bluegrass title track complete with fiddle from Bronwyn Keith-Hines and also
mandolin from Karl Smakula and ‘My Mountain’ is also similar melodic banjo-driven
bluegrass.

‘Getting High in Hotel Rooms’ is a lovely delicate (autobiographical?) blues with
shimmering slide guitar and organ from Ty Bailee, while ‘Everything is Fine’ starts
with heavy bass from Geoff Henderson and also features crashing guitar chords.
Blues guitarist J D Simo joins Cristina on the up tempo ‘Shake it Baby’ and also the
poignant, atmospheric slow blues ‘Lost You in the Mountains’ and ‘Storm Brewing’
is another banjo-led bluegrass song with nice lead guitar and tripping drums from
Roger Ross. This new album has a lot less blues than her previous two albums and
is definitely more Americana – the blues influence is still here (and the slide guitar)
but she’s moved more into the territory of Gillian Welch and Sarah Jarosz.
Nonetheless this is an impressive album with good original songs and fine playing
and Cristina’s vocals are also very good, sweet but with the occasional snarl – and I
guess that this mix of styles will be more commercial than a straight blues record.

Graham Harrison