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Artist |
Super Chikan |
| Title |
Shoot that Thang |
| Label |
Rooster Blues Records |
| Reviewer |
Richard Proplesch |
| Rating |
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Putting a squeeze on the old adage "what's so good about
feeling blue," James "Super Chikan" Johnson is one of
the most buoyant bluesmen you'll encounter this lifetime
or next. A Mississippi farmhand who worked for the
Mennonites most of his life, Chikan's tunes are
outrageously raw ("Staingy Wid It") and refreshingly
festive ("Don't Mess With The Blues") for a late-
blooming musician that fashions his guitars out of
flattened gas cans (their tinny sound is surprisingly
effective). Somehow, you just can't sit still or stay
grumpy whenever Chikan's at the mic, giving regards to
the full-figured ladies of "Junky Trunk". Given his
genial disposition, whimsical verses (his "Mennonite
Blues" is as ironic as anything ZZ Top ever spun), and
biting, Albert King-like picking ("Tin Top Shack" sports
a wonderful double-tracked, wah-wahed solo), Chikan may
become one of the blues' finest ambassadors.
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© 2001 AMZ/music-reviewer.com
Robert R. Lewis
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