Jump to Content

Waxed - Record Review from Issue #63 May-June 2006

Smokin' Joe Kubek & Bnois King

My Heart's In Texas (Blind Pig)

By

Of all the road warriors on the contemporary House Of Blues etc. circuit — think Anson Funderburgh, Rod Piazza, Duke Robillard — these guys are the least purist, and that’s no putdown. They’re more from the Stevie Ray than Jimmie Vaughan tradition, and their brand of boogie wouldn’t have been out of place on the stage of the Fillmore during the glory days of blues-rock. Like many such bands, they’re best taken in smaller doses than you get on this live album. Still, Smokin’ Joe Kubek has a huge catalogue of licks, and he mixes them impressively on tracks like the nine-minute “Where I Want To Be”. Bnois King, who’s usually content to provide a soft yet solid rhythm guitar, offers some jazzy lead lines of his own on that one, and his vocals (somewhat reminiscent of, say, Albert King in their conversational warmth) are a steadying influence on Kubek’s guitar pyrotechnics. If you’ve got any taste for high-energy, blues-rock throwbacks, you’re unlikely to find anyone doing it better.

Enjoy the ND archives? Consider making a donation. Advertising helps defray our basic expenses, but doesn’t touch the over $150,000 invested to get this content online. Just $10 (or more!) from 15,000 of our fans and we will reach our goal. Thanks for your support.

Or send a check to: No Depression, PO Box 31332, Seattle, WA 98103

Discuss

Did you enjoy this article? Start a discussion about it, or find out what others are saying in the No Depression Community forum.

Join the Discussion »

Find out what's going on in roots music. Share concert photos and videos, learn about new artists, blog about the music you love.

Join the No Depression Community »

Originally Featured in Issue #63 May-June 2006

Cover of Issue #63 May-June 2006

Buy this issue

More articles from this issue:

  • James Hunter

    James Hunter - Everybody's Talking • Sitting in a Manhattan soul food restaurant and discussing the prospect of fame, James Hunter peppers his speech with the colorful argot of his native Colchester, on the east coas…

  • Alejandro Escovedo

    Alejandro Escovedo - Hepatitis C nearly killed Alejandro Escovedo three years ago. Friends, fans, and his idols helped inspire his return to music • Alejandro Escovedo no longer takes anything for granted. Always a courtly gentleman with a soft-spoken manner, he begins the interview by asking, "How are you?" Fine, Al, grea…

  • Imaad Wasif

    Imaad Wasif - At his most beautiful • "I want to save people with music," Imaad Wasif writes, with unabashed sincerity, in the press release that accompanies his self-titled solo debut. "I feel that I was born to siph…

Buy our history before it’s gone!

Each issue is artfully designed and packed full of great photos that you don‘t get online. Visit the No Depression store to own a piece of history.

Visit the No Depression Store »

From the Blogs

  • Stackridge, Farncombe Music Club (UK, 5/18/12)
    I first started going to live gigs in my early teens. I was underage. I lied about my date of birth so that I could become a member of Friars, a music club based in Buckinghamshire and Bedfordshire. Life membership was 25p. I still have my member’s card. Wild Turkey in June 1971 was the first live band I saw and some forty one years later I am still occupyin […]
  • Bonnie Raitt, John Prine & Tom Waits at Opryland (circa '74)
    Bonnie, Johnny & Tom Visit Opryland, USA — an interview-article by W. Conrad for Buddy Magazine (March, 1976)

 
 
Backstage and on stage at Nashville's Opryland, Ben Fong-Torres, rock journalist from 
Rolling Stone, was shadowing Bonnie Raitt, the star of the evening's attraction. In the shadows, lurking inside his cheap suit and a cloud of to […]
  • The Last Time I Saw Gram Parsons
    By Bill Conrad (His Prep School Pal)

 Summer of 1969, I was in London when I saw a flyer advertising the Byrds at Royal Albert Hall. Melody Maker, the local music news, suggested that a few Beatles and Stones might attend. That was incentive enough for me.
  The Byrds took the stage and launched into "Turn, Turn, Turn."  Other than band leader Rog […]
  • Davina and the Vagabonds at Newcastle Cluny II
    The Cluny, Newcastle Thursday 17th May 2012 Alan Harrison One of my greatest pleasures is discovering new music any of its shapes and forms and tonight was a bit of a revelation as I had only ventured out of the house because there was nothing on TV. As the support act finished there were only about 30 people scattered around The Cluny and perhaps 75 were sc […]
  • Lee Ann Womack Helps Houston's Homeless
    As founder and president of Healthcare for the Homeless -- Houston (HHH), Dr. David Buck (left with country star Lee Ann Womack at First Lady's Luncheon, Washington, D.C) is a busy man. So busy, in fact, he was taken aback when his office got a voice message from U.S. Representative Gene Green's wife Helen saying that she would like Dr. Buck to att […]
  • TPR#88 Addam Scott - Interview and Music
    On episode 88 of the Taproot Music Show, Addam Scott, the musician, not the actor, talks to Calvin about his latest CD, San Diablo. He discusses the concept of conflict that runs through the CD and how he likes ““I like to move forward that contradiction and show the best of who we are as people and the worst of who we are as people.” He discusses his musica […]

Shop Amazon by clicking through this logo to support NoDepression.com. We get a percentage of every purchase you make!

Subscribe To the No Depression Newsletter

Subscribe to the No Depression Newsletter

Network With Us