NAKED… IN YOUR FACE Eddie Turner & The Trouble Twins (7-14 Productions)A guitar legend, caught live in action last summer at The Blues Can in Calgary. Not the greatest sound quality, more like an very good sounding bootleg- but that is a big part of Naked… In Your Face’s charm.Turner came up in the 70’s but, surprisingly, this is his first live record. It sounds like a sweaty, intimate gig. Recorded August 2nd, 2015, engineered, mixed and mastered by Marco Levesque and produced by Devil Boy, this has a raw ‘as it went down’ feel- no overdubs that I can tell. Is it perfect? No- but in a situation like this, perfection would be suspect.Aside from Eddie on guitar and vocals we have Anna Lisa Hughes on vocals and bass and Kelly Kruse on vocals and drums. In a trio format there’s nowhere to hide but I suspect on the night most where there to hear Eddie Turner play, and play he did. He might not have the lightning some of the other blues cats might but he is wonderfully expressive and full of soul, whether laying down some chords in the verse or taking off on a solo- kind of reminds me of Albert Collins with a touch of BB King.Stephen Stills says that Turner’s playing reminds him of Jimi Hendrix, and Guitar Player Magazine calls him “a master at creating spooky atmospherics, a funky and hard rocking psychedelic bluesman in the Hendrix tradition”, so there you go. Sound quality of Naked… In Your Face is good, but I wish it had been better. Regardless, it’s a joy to have the chance to hear Eddie Turner play and I very much recommend this set.
ESSENTIALS: Dangerous, Mistreated, Blues Fall Down Like Rain
