North Mississippi Allstars: Shake Hands With Shorty : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

The blues have been spiffed up for tourist consumption in many urban locales, but in the hill country of northern Mississippi they still slither like a kingsnake. That's where R.L. Burnside rules; the songs of the septuagenarian blues icon and his mentor, the late Fred McDowell, provide raw material for the North Mississippi Allstars on Shake Hands With Shorty. The Allstars are a project of Luther and Cody Dickinson, the sons of legendary Memphis producer Jim Dickinson. Though their vocals lack distinction, their shambling Cream-colored shuffles add some twists to the trancy hill-country boogie identified with Burnside and the late Junior Kimbrough. The bottom suddenly drops out of "Po Black Maddie" to make way for a sublime, blissed-out slide solo; a quote from the Allman Brothers' "Blue Sky" drifts across an epic version of Kimbrough's "All Night Long"; and a few dollops of dub-reggae reverb suggest the boys are hip to the more experimental side of the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion. But what impresses most is the way the Dickinsons, along with R.L.'s kin Cedric and Garry Burnside, get down in the mud with "Goin' Down South," a hellish romp through the hill country that makes most city-slicker blues sound tame. (RS 839)

GREG KOT