SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: THE BLASTERS – RARE BLASTS: STUDIO OUTTAKES AND MOVIE MUSIC 1979-1985

THE BLASTERS
RARE BLASTS: STUDIO OUTTAKES AND MOVIE MUSIC 1979-1985  
LIBERATION HALL

An American Music Story: The Complete Studio Recordings 1979-1985 was a superb release in last year’s Record Store Day offerings, a comprehensive five LP overview of the Los Angeles roots-rock band’s career that immediately sold out. Rare Blasts : Studio Outtakes And Movie Music 1979-1985 was the fifth album and as with the other components, it is now available as a separate entity, released on CD and Cobalt blue vinyl. Both are fine of course, but vinyl is what suits the music best of all. Whilst many bands around this time were picking up on Magic Sam’s deep blues guitar lines and using them as the basis for longer solos, The Blasters open this release with his energetic, rockabilly-flavoured “21 Days In Jail,” all of two minutes and 16 seconds, deep echo on the vocal and all. There are 14 tracks here by the original, classic Blasters line-up, plus 50s New Orleans saxman, Lee Allen on five tracks, boogie-woogie piano player Gene Taylor (try the rendition of Howling Wolf’s “I’m So Glad,” which also has Phil Alvin on blues harp), and the much sought-after Bobby King helping out on backing vocals on one track.

Really though, this isn’t music for deep analysis, though the songs’ origins suggest The Blasters had in-depth knowledge. If you’re looking for good-natured, good rocking music that draws from blues, vintage R’n’B, and the wilder side of foundation rock ‘n’ roll, and with a punky, not over-reverent attitude (try maybe ‘Lonely Wolf’), then this is most definitely the place.

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