Watermelon Time in the Nisqually Delta

The Nu-Vines

Tendril Records

reviewed by Robert Horn

This band has been around in one form or another since the 1980's. Most have families & day jobs but some are former professional musicians. They also confirm several opinions I have held for sometime now: 1) that there is more talent in this region than the world knows about; 2) that there are many local blues musicians who are usually underhonored but better quality than the top-40 musicians that are household names; and 3) that blues reaches something deep inside the listener that no other music can do.

There is a variety on this CD. Mostly it is blues. There is a little jazz also. There is also something here that straddles some fences between blues, jazz, and R&B. In some promotional material with the CD there is mention of "blues and rhythm" repeatedly and there is no other evidence these people are dyslexic so my research concludes that they state it that way on purpose.

There are some songs on here I loved including: "Highway 410", "The Road Between" (this one shows the quality of vocals that Lorraine Hart can do, she is yet another great female vocalist I would like to tell the world about), "Delta Boy", "Something On My Mind", "She's Gotta Move", "Rosemary" (this is in a style that will make you think of Keb Mo-- hell give this song a Grammy please) and " When You Got The Blues", are my favorites here.

Most of the vocals were done by Billy Blue and Lorraine Hart, but some guest artists appear on the CD and a couple of them do some vocals. There names are Billy Stoops and Leanne Travalyn. Other guest artists doing some work on some of the songs are Bob Summarrise the DJ from old Blues shows on the radio years ago doing an introductory narrative, Hunter Hale doing tap dancing on one cut, Ellis Carter doing some sax work, Steve Sarandos also on one song with his tenor sax, Denny Hall on mandolin on one song.

The primary musicians with the instrument work on the CD are Steven Blood on guitar, Gene Hubbard on keyboards, Terry Jae on bass, Scott Warfield on drums, and DeReese Wiggins on assorted reeds and strings.

It is fun to listen to. I will do that again. This is more evidence that the Northwest has a wealth of good musicians.