Randy Bachman pulls his weight on ‘Heavy Blues’
Bachman, “Heavy Blues” (Linus Entertainment)
Where has this been for the past four decades?
Randy Bachman, who made classic rock history with Bachman-Turner Overdrive and The Guess Who, has recorded his best album since 1976.
The name says it all: heavy blues, delivered with help from an All-Star cast of guests, including Neil Young, Peter Frampton, Joe Bonamassa, Robert Randolph and Jeff Healey.
If this was 1975 and the radio still played rock, there might be a half-dozen hit singles on “Heavy Blues.” The opening track, “The Edge,” sounds like BTO playing a mashup of “You Ain’t Seen Nothin’ Yet” and The Who’s “Won’t Get Fooled Again.”
“Ton of Bricks” hits the listener as advertised; “Little Girl Lost,” a daddy-never-loved-me, now-I’m-a-hooker song, features some memorable, instantly recognizable fuzz-tone guitar from Young; and “Confessing to the Devil” features posthumous licks from Healey from a long-ago unreleased session with Bachman.
The catchiest track on the album is “Wild Texas Ride,” featuring a boogie drum beat over raw guitars and enough cowbells to make even Will Ferrell happy. It’s really good to see Bachman takin’ care of business again.