‘Professin’ the Blues‘ by Fiona Boyes is Eastside Radio’s Album of the Week. Fiona Boyes, an Australian blues guitarist, vocalist, and songwriter, has been recording and performing for more than 25 years, and came back with a brand new record that will delight every blues fan. With only a guitar, a surprising voice, and a few drums, she manages to build a strong and efficient album. She manages to take the very essence of the blues music and to put it in her songs.
Fiona is a veteran recording artist with 13 releases. Australia’s first lady of the Blues has five USA Blues Music Award nominations in four different categories, and more than 30 Australian music awards, spanning the blues, folk, jazz and Americana genres. Her immersion in the wide musical and historical traditions that make up the blues and her deep love of the art-form itself lends conviction and authenticity to her playing and songwriting. Beginning her career as a blues artist when she won an Australian made Maton guitar in a local coffee shop talent show, she honed her skills with all female band The Mojos, who went on to become one of Australia’s premier blues acts. She started solo recording in 2000, and gaine worldwide renown in 2003 when she won the International Blues Challenge in Memphis, being the first woman and first non-American to be so honoured. Once again, she came back a the top of her art with that fantastic blues record, ‘Professin’ the Blues‘.
The very first second of the album set the atmosphere with the powerful ‘Can’t Stay Here No More‘. First an acoustic guitar played perfectly, bringing us on the old US road where it all started. Then, a voice. And what a voice. Surprising by her strength, but able to reach high pitched notes alongside deep low howling, Fiona’s voice is astonishing. And finally, powerful and heady, like the tambours of an ancient Indian clan, the drum. Simple but incredibly efficient, that’s what Fiona proposes us from the beginning of her new record. A blues without any artefact, expressing the very core of that music. It takes only 1 minutes to sink into the album’s universe, which couldn’t wear a most accurate name. She is professing the blues in every aspects. She speaks of that devil that haunted blues music in ‘Devil You Know‘, the same devil that following the legend give the gift of playing the guitar to Robert Johnson against his soul. She plays the guitar like a goddess, singing the pains and the roads, love and life. In that album, Fiona Boyes manages to give us a picture of the blues she loves, a pure and direct blues. All that sincerity irigate the entire album, from the tender ‘Kiss Me Darling‘ to the swinging ‘At the Crossroads‘.
This new opus is praised by the listeners and by the critics. As Iain Patience from Rhythms Magazine writes in the first review of the album “Boyes has a strong, searching voice and tackles a variety of blues grooves without missing a beat, skipping lightly from a stong Texan, Lightin’ Hopkins opener through ragtime rhytmic drive and reggea-inspired numbers that also include light jazz touches and some abolutly top fretwork. This is an album that is immediatly gripping from the very off and highligh Boyes own songwriting strenghts… Professin’ the Blues is an album that carries her power forward with total mastery and confidence, a wonderful offering”. If you love blues and guitar playing, this album is made for you. Deep and powerful, it’ll make you travel on the dusty roads of America, in a dream where music is the heart and soul of everything.
Track Listing:
1. Can’t Stay Here No More
2. Devil You Know
3. Lay Down with Dogs
4. Angels and Boats
5. One Rule For You
6. Card Sharp
7. Old and Stiff
8. Kiss Me Darling
9. Love Me All the Way
10. Stubborn Old Mule
11. Catfish Fiesta
12. If I Should Die
13. At the Crossroads
14. Love Changing Blues
15. Baby Please Don’t Go
16. Dace in the Mirror
You can follow Fiona Boyes’s career at fionaboyes.com or via her FACEBOOK page. For an extended listen to the album, tune in on Thursday from 1.30PM – 2PM for ‘Album of the Week’ with Paul Goupille. Don’t forget to also listen out for your opportunity to win a copy of ‘Professin’ The Blues’’ all week. You must be a supporter to win so make sure to sign up at https://eastsidefm.org/support-us-2/. You can also stream the station at WWW.EASTSIDEFM.ORG
