WBS CD Review

Blast Off

Blues Orbiters

www.bluesorbiters.com

Reveiwed by Diane Wells

Blast Off immediately grabs your attention with an upbeat, humorously scribed shuffle called “Love Makes You Fat”. Apart from the following boogie, “Somedays” (Johnny Whitehill), resplendent with harmonica and saxophone, “Phone Booth” (a Robert Cray collaboration with D. Walker, R. Cousins and M. Vannice), and a re-working of “T-Bone Shuffle” (Aaron “T-Bone” Walker), the remaining tracks are all penned by members of the Blues Orbiters.

The vocals, all very pleasant, are shared as well among Jeff Hayes, on drums, Peter Norris, on guitar, and Brian Lee on guitar, slide guitar, and harmonica. As well, this self-reliant group of skillful musicians, which includes bass player Roger Smith and saxophonist Jim Wallis, has done just about everything here, from the topnotch CD art and photos to the slick production work, with engineering help by Steve Smith. Brent Brewer designed the brilliant CD logo, the Seattle Space Needle morphed into a rocket ship with the band members’ faces peering out of “porthole” windows!

Not unlike Vancouver’s Powder Blues Band and Niagara Falls’ Nightshift Blues Band in their smooth exuberance and vitality, this Seattle band’s music is mostly up-tempo, extremely catchy and danceable, notably “Straight From the Jar” (Jeffrey Hayes and Brian Lee), a slide guitar shuffle. “Don’t Be Afraid of the Thunder”, cleverly composed by Jeffrey Hayes and Peter Norris, is a slow blues guided by a mournful harmonica, sultry blues guitar, and some of the rudest saxophone work I’ve ever heard, peaking with a rolling rumble of thunder!

“A Test of Time” is a relaxing jazz number that redefines “cool”, with Jeff trading the sticks for some rhythmic hand-slapping on congas. But before you can get too complacent, along comes the self-explanatory “Rhumba Boogie Blues”, which might find you taking a spin around the moon!

Another favourite track, “Big Moon Rising”, is an enchanting heart-felt slow blues by Brian Lee, with accompaniment on saxophone and a suitably subtle bass line, which reminded me of the late Dave Conant. Even though it’s almost nine minutes in length, it still left me wanting to hear more!

“T-Bone Shuffle”, a classic cover for many musicians, which seems to leave a lot of room for an unique interpretation by each one, leaves us with a happy reminder of the joy that blues music can give us!

When I mentioned to drummer Jeff Hayes that there was a blues-jazz club in Toronto called the Orbit Room, co-owned by Rush’s Alex Lifeson, he starting getting some booking ideas…let’s hope the “mission” gets accomplished some time soon!

It’s a very impressive début CD that fits in well into any blues-lover’s collection!

Bailey's Blue Flames
Bailey's Blues - MIddlefield

Tab Benoit
Wetlands - Engelhart
Wetlands - Dunigan

Blues Orbiters
Blast Off -Oxford
Blast Off -Engelhart
Blast Off -Wells

Blues Union
Extra Blue - Engelhart

J.J. Cale
Anyway Anthology -Dunigan

Malcolm Clark Band
Stories for the Blue -Engelhart

Coldsweat
Nocturnal -Majkut
Corporate Slave -Majkut

Dave Conant
Chiaroscuro -Wells

Jack Cook & Marc Breitfelder
Feed My Body to... - Horn

Henry Cooper
Automatic Trouble - Engelhart

James Cotton
35th Anniversary Jam - Horn