Joe Bonamassa has a well established reputation in the blues and rock worlds as an unbelievable guitarist. Once you earn a reputation as an artist, you’re presented with the conundrum of how to keep exploring your range as a musician while not straying too far from the style your fans want to hear and see.
Bonamassa manages to pull off this balancing act on Blues of Desperation, his twelfth studio album, which also sees the former boy-prodigy continue his mission to mine the sound of the blues guitarists of the ’50s and ’60s to create his own style.
Blues of Desperation contains plenty of those reputation-earning guitar solos, and Bonamassa’s playing is emotive, tight and melodic regardless of the level of distortion. The standout solo is the eruption of wah wah soaked notes on Distant Lonesome Train.
Bonamassa plies his trade over a number of genres, from the driving rock of This Train and Mountain Climbing, to the eight-and-a-half minute swinging blues of No Place for the Lonely and the rollicking Chuck Berry-esque You Left Me Nothin’ But the Bill and the Blues.
There’s also The Valley Runs Low and Drive – on the former, Bonamassa’s 12-string picking is accompanied by breezy electric piano and lyrics about country life, while on the latter his acoustic strumming sits below washes of clean electric, invoking images of a journey through the Wild West.
Bonamassa’s singing also continues to evolve. He used to be breathy and quiet, and once said his greatest regret was not beginning to sing earlier in life, but he now allows his voice to inhabit the song as prominently as his guitar playing.
BY ALEXANDER DARLING
