Straight Talkin’ (label)
11 November 2022 (released)
04 November 2022
About 25 years ago, there was a resurgence of young artists playing Blues music. In the US this included players such as Johnny Lang, Kenny Wayne Shepherd and Joe Bonamassa, while in the UK the leaders were Ian Parker, Jon Amor, Matt Schofield, Danny Bryant and Aynsley Lister. The influence that these artists have on the likes of Ben Poole. Kris Barras et al is pretty well undeniable.
This is Lister’s 14th album and the first since ‘Eyes Wide Open’ from 2016.
Lister has moved away from the straight Blues that he started out with. This time around, his music is melodic and tuneful with a very contemporary feel to it and his vocals have really improved with a subtle and gentle tone. It would not be unreasonable to say that 2022 sees Aynsley Lister as a top vocal artist who also plays guitar.
This isn’t the roaring Strat frenzy that many Blues players look to, there is a lot of other influence, especially around the more funky orientation of a few tracks – ‘Wait For Me especially’ – but he can still play harder from time to time and so there is a fine variety of music across the album. ‘Masquerade’ sees his vocals very much to the fore although it also boasts the best guitar solo on the album, and the two parts of ‘Eve’ – ‘On To You’ & ‘Love You To Death’ present a chilling tale of infatuation across two very different numbers.
I really enjoyed the anthemic ‘Cast A Light’ with a gentle Hammond backing from Russ Parker, as well as the tear up on ‘World Is Falling’ but there isn’t a weak number here and the time between albums seems to have been well spent.
Aynsley is still growing and developing his music and there are songs here that rank among his best.
One of the better albums of 2022.
