Blues players let regional boundaries get blurred

Blues players let regional boundaries get blurred
April 16, 2010
By Roger Levesque
Edmonton Journal

There was a time when blues artists used to focus on one regional style or another, but for a new generation of players, those boundaries don't matter.

Meet Moreland & Arbuckle. That's Aaron Moreland, an acoustic and electric guitarist and sometime banjo player, and harmonica player/ singer Dustin Arbuckle. Raised around the rather unlikely blues locale of Wichita, Kan., they met in 2001 and tried out several bands before trimming things down.

Since 2006, they have often had drummer Brad Horner in tow. He's on Flood, their entertaining new debut album for Telarc, and again on the current tour, which brings them to Edmonton tonight. Fans may recall the trio opened last year's Edmonton's Labatt Blues Festival.

All three are about 30 and grew up with a mix of musical influences that incorporated various shades of blues, classic rock, grunge, metal and more. So Flood offers a surprising range of tunes, from quieter acoustic ballads to raw, rocking, earthy electric numbers, mostly material penned by the duo with a couple of older blues classics thrown in.

"We just try to make the music we want to make," says Arbuckle. "That tends to be very blues-based but eclectic, and that works in our favour to give us a wide appeal, not to pigeonhole us."

They have become better and better at feeling out their audiences.

"We can play straight-ahead blues, or rock harder if that's what the crowd wants, or strip it down. Even with the spartan setup with guitar, drums and harmonica, it still lends itself to quite a few different options."

While they don't give much thought to different styles, they do explore the history of their own region in song. Both the title song Flood and the track 18 Counties touch on a natural disaster that came to Kansas two years back.

It's a measure of their appeal that the trio has been opening for Buddy Guy on several other tour dates, and that they were signed to major-label-based Telarc after three albums. Their initial all-acoustic album Floyd's Market (2006) was followed by Caney Valley Blues (2007), and 1861 (2008, on Northern Blues).

Moreland & Arbuckle play tonight at Century Casino (13103 Fort Rd.), 8 p.m. Tickets are $12.99 or $10 for Edmonton Blues Society members, in advance from the venue box office or Megatunes on Whyte Avenue, or at the door.

BLUES STORYTELLER

Portland, Maine isn't an obvious blues town either, but it is home of Samuel James, one of the most spirited newcomers on the acoustic side of the music.

Drawing his initial inspirations from early blues greats like Son House and from a musical DNA that goes back several generations, guitarist-singer James, 30, has been a wonderful new discovery for Ottawa's Northern Blues label.

Both of his albums on the label, Songs Famed For Sorrow And Joy (2008), and For Rosa, Maeve And Noreen (2009) exhibit a refreshing contrast of honed blues grooves, a real touch for storytelling in song, and a vocal intensity that promises a strong show when James makes his Edmonton debut Saturday.

James shows some real ingenuity in coming up with his stories. One number from the first album that does take a specific historical bent is The Sad Ballad of Old Willie Chan.

"Of all the train songs and folk songs to come out of America, I think it's the very first song about a Chinese railroad worker, even though the railroads were almost entirely built by the Chinese. There's still a lot to be done."

He tours solo with a resonator guitar and a flamenco guitar, throws in surprising covers, and has a well-studied knowledge of regional blues styles. "There's something about this music and the intimacy of one person and one instrument. It's a conversation between you and the audience."

Samuel James performs Saturday at 8 p.m. at Blue Chair Cafe (9624 76th Ave.). Call 780-989-2861 or e-mail reso@bluechair.ca