Dig

1	Payday 4:43
2	Sarah 4:45
3	Miss Riddle 6:27
4	I Just Go 4:50
5	Get on the Natch 4:50
6	Desire 5:32
7	Call That Love 4:18
8	King of El Paso 5:16
9	You're Not 4:19
10	Vanishing Point 4:48
11	Thanks to You 6:00

Barnes & Noble

It's been said that you can't go home again, but don't try telling that to Boz Scaggs, who with this disc revisits the stomping grounds that propelled him to stardom in the '70s, and doggone if he doesn't make the return engagement a fruitful one. While brimming with the tasteful blue-eyed soul stylings that took songs like "Georgia" and "Lowdown" into the mass consciousness two decades back, Dig doesn't sound like a communing with the ghosts of charts past. Scaggs plays nice and easy on a batch of smoky ballads, including "Desire" and "Thanks to You," the latter of which coasts along on a breezy solo from trumpeter Roy Hargrove, but he also shows a heartening willingness to toughen up when the time is right. To that end, he gives up the funk on "Call That Love," which pops and crackles with sinuous energy, and swaggers with good-natured panache on the swinging "Get on the Natch." At times, Dig does succumb to the wrong kind of nostalgia, with longtime collaborator Jeff Paich employing a few too many of the tricks he learned as part of Toto. But when Scaggs keeps his eyes focused forward, the album gives off the kind of sunny, timeless vibe that's all too uncommon in the pop of the new millennium. David Sprague

All Music Guide

Boz Scaggs returns to the arena with the thoroughly modern Dig, four years after his much-acclaimed return to traditional R&B on Come On Home. This takes no small bit of courage for an artist like Scaggs who has reveled in obscurity for most of the last 20 years. Come On Home won the man all sort of critical platitudes for making unfashionable roots music in a highly unlikely time. It showed, of course, in that the record sold barely respectably. Dig is, if anything a hypermodern take on R n' B. Scaggs and co-producers David Paich (who co-wrote virtually all the material here) and guitarist Danny Kortchmar have embraced modern production, recording and mixing techniques in the same way Scaggs did on Silk Degrees (which part two of this is definitely not). The result is simply a very fine adult contemporary take on rhythm and blues that showcases Scaggs in the finest voice he's given us in decades, a solid batch of tunes and very few irritating elements. Scaggs use of hip-hop methodologies in tracks like "Desire," with Michael Rodriguez's programming, is subtle enough to add atmosphere to an already beautiful song.. The tune is a ballad so smooth and streetwise, so late night in feel and sentiment, the timberline drum program just underlines the spooky guitars and Scaggs sweet crooning-in fact, his voice here sounds better than it ever has. There are other modernisms that Scaggs employs here that would have been better left on the cutting room floor such as his insistence on rapping on "Just Go," where he sounds like a Wal-Mart cross between Frank Zappa on "Dina Moe Hum" and Tom Waits from Bone Machine. But there are only a couple of moments like that, his blues roots manifest themselves well on "King of El Paso," and his embrace of Latin-tinged pop suits him well on "Call That Love." While it's a slick record, in typical Scaggs fashion, it's a slim cast of characters who pull it all off-mainly Scaggs, Paich and Kortchmar (who is as fine a guitarist as ever), with guests like Ray Parker Jr., pedal steel god Steve Lukather and jazz trumpeter Roy Hargrove Jr. lending their hands in various spots. For a guy everybody said was in the hallmark of memory a long time ago, Boz Scaggs is making remarkably refreshing and compelling music. Dig is mature enough to resonate well with his aging audience, and it's slick and polished enough to catch the ear of pop radio programmers-at least I hope so. With precious few rough spots, Dig is a pop triumph by a sleight of sound master. ~ Thom Jurek, All Music Guide

Blender

[Skaggs has] found his groove on this surprisingly ambitious collection. Erik Himmelsbach