Blues to the Bone

1	I Got My Mojo Working 3:34
2	Don't Start Me to Talking 2:52
3	Hush Hush 3:34
4	Lil' Red Rooster 3:54
5	That's Alright 3:42
6	Crawlin' King Snake 5:32
7	Dust My Broom 3:35
8	The Sky Is Crying 3:59
9	Smokestack Lightnin' 6:50
10	You Shook Me 3:51
11	Driving Wheel 2:59
12	Honey, Don't Tear My Clothes 3:31

Barnes & Noble

Over the past 40 years, Etta James’s career has been revived by soundtrack appearances, jazz ballads, and live sets. But on Blues to the Bone, the big, bossy-voiced singer, who has been performing since she was 13, goes back to the days when she recorded for Chess Records. In addition to James’s hot R&B hits, Chess also released the recordings of Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf, Sonny Boy Williamson, and just about every other seminal artist in the electric blues movement. It is these masters that James salutes on Blues to the Bone. She slinks like a snake dancer through “Lil’ Red Rooster,” “The Sky Is Crying,” and “That’s Alright.” “Got My Mojo Working” and “Don’t Start Me to Talking” are dusted off for a more contemporary blues sound. Driven by the solid drumming of James’s son Donto, these versions are in line with the live shows James has been doing for the past 20 years. Reflecting the acoustic beginnings of the blues are stripped-to-the-bone renditions of the John Lee Hooker signature tune “Crawlin’ King Snake,” Elmore James’s “The Sky Is Crying,” and Lightnin’ Hopkins’s “Honey, Don’t Tear My Clothes.” Though there is a little renovation done to these blues foundations, Blues to the Bone is a sincere tribute. Roberta Penn

All Music Guide

Etta James has worked in countless styles throughout her long career, and she is equally at home singing gospel, R&B, soul, jazz, and even rock & roll, but her roots have always been solidly planted in the blues, and she is arguably the finest living singer active in the genre. Perhaps because she doesn't sing only the blues, however, when she does, it sticks out as something special, and with Blues to the Bone she goes down to the river and dives in completely, turning out a solid album of no-frills, gutbucket performances. Her voice has deepened and coarsened over the years, making it the perfect vehicle of authenticity and authority as she tackles classics of the genre like John Lee Hooker's "Crawling King Snake," Robert Johnson's "Dust My Broom," and Howlin' Wolf's "Smokestack Lightning," backed by a garage blues combo led by her sons, Donito and Sametto James. James' versions bring new dimensions to each of these hoary old chestnuts, which have generally been sung by men, and her smoke-tinged alto makes each her own, instilling them all with a wise, desperate, and confident intimacy. She gives Jimmy Reed's "Hush Hush" a solid reading, while her take on Willie Dixon's "Lil' Red Rooster" is a tension-filled, atmospheric gem. The most striking track here, however, is James' version of the Elmore James tune "The Sky Is Crying," which emerges as epic and poignant. Much of contemporary blues spins on its own excesses and on a hundred years of accumulative clichés, but when an artist like Etta James comes home to sing the blues, the world has to rejoice and take notice, because in her hands the old clichéd phrases become vital and new again. Steve Leggett