Ghost Town Blues Band

Hard Road To Hoe
Self Produced

I’ll tell you what — if I were in Memphis and wanted to book the perfect party blues band, I’d be calling the Ghost Town Blues Band. These guys put it all out, from grease to grit to funk; they’re going to fill your dance floor and put smiles and a groove into everybody in attendance. Their music covers ground from all over the map, which may be a reflection on not only leader Matt Isbell, but the entirety of the band’s taste and background. Their new album, Hard Road To Hoe, exposes the band’s musical diversity in all its glory from start to finish.

Remember this band’s winning performance at The Orpheum Theater during the 2014 International Blues Challenge where they began by doing a march from the back of the room to the stage. That number is here, “Mr. Handy Man,” and it serves as an intro into a jovial, finger-snapper of a song “Hate To See Her Go,” with Suavo Jones on trombone and Richie Hale on sax setting the mood. It’s another take of the old classic vision of “I hate to see you go, but I love to watch you walk away.” Also from that memorable IBC performance you’ll recognize Preston McEwen’s use of the electric analog broom with its distinct percussive sound on the title track, “Hard Road To Hoe.”

There are a number of really fun tracks guaranteed to put a smile on your face, like the pairing with Isbell and harmonica man Brandon Santini as they tell you all about “My Doggy” and all his little habits. Santini also guests on the song “Tip Of My Hat.” There is “Big Shirley,” with Jeremy Powell laying out the pace on keyboards, as Isbell describes that gal Big Shirley has little bitty feet and great big thighs, the kind that Mississippi could recognize. And when she hears that boogie woogie she’ll be shaking her rump.

But there are also moments on Hard Road To Hoe that are reminiscent of some of Robbie Robertson’s best songwriting. Matt Isbell captures this nicely on numbers like “Seventeen” and “Dead Sea.” On “Nothing But Time” Isbell soars on the slow guitar piece and you can feel his pain as he sings the loss of his love to a new man, but he will not shed a tear because he has nothing but time. The album finishes out with a beautiful acoustic guitar number, “Road Still Drives The Same.” It caps off a recording that takes on many shapes and moods, all of them good.

Ghost Town Blues Band have done it again, another terrific album. Hard Road To Hoe is very much recommended.

Total Time: 39:11

Hard Road To Hoe / Big Shirley / Tip Of My Hat / My Doggy / Mr. Handy Man / Hate To See Her Go / Tied My Worries To A Stone / Dead Sea / Nothin’ But Time / Dime In The Well / Seventeen / Road Still Drives The Same.