BY KEVIN RANSOM
Sometimes, the passing of the years has a way of putting old
clichés to rest.
That has certainly been the case for Robert Cray. It's been
nearly 20 years since Cray was rather simplistically, and falsely, touted by
much of the music press as "the great black hope for the blues.''
To be sure, that was a tempting moniker for some to bestow
on the young Cray, since he was a young black blues guitarist in a genre that
was mostly dominated by older black blues masters or younger white guitar
slingers. But since Cray is now 52, he now almost qualifies as one of the
"older black players.''
The "great black hope'' label was always a facile one,
however - because Cray has never been a straight blues artist. While his guitar
style is heavily influenced by the crisp, string-bending, urban-blues fretwork
of B.B. King, T-Bone Walker and Bobby "Blue'' Bland, Cray's music is
equally inspired by the silky, soul-man testifying of Sam Cooke, Al Green,
Marvin Gaye and other great classic-soul singers.
"Yeah, I got caught up in the blues guitar thing really
early, but I also just couldn't let go of all that great soul music I heard
when I was growing up, the guys who were influenced by gospel,'' said Cray,
whose band headlines the Friday lineup at the Ann Arbor Folk
Festival.
"We played another folk festival last year,'' Cray said
during a recent phone interview. "We've also
played jazz festivals, and rock festivals. That's the way the music world is
now. People don't seem to care about those so-called boundaries the way they
used to.''
One aspect of Cray's music that still distinguishes him from
classic blues artists is that he often writes songs about more topical,
contemporary issues. Cray's last two albums have featured a few songs about the
human cost of the war in Iraq,
including the title track of his latest disc, "Twenty.''
On "Twenty,'' Cray's sound is stylistically expansive,
as always. A couple of tracks, "Two Steps from the End'' and "My Last
Regret'' synergize the blues and jazz, and the requisite cheating song,
"Poor Johnny,'' grooves to a reggae-fied lilt.
"It Doesn't Show'' is straight blues, while "Does It Really Matter''
churns to a tough rocking-blues rhythm.
"I've always been interested in the shared roots of
jazz and blues,'' said Cray of "Two Steps'' and "My Last Regret.''
"I love the way those two can come together and sort of show that they
came from the same place.''
Although the days of being anointed as the savior of the
blues are long gone, Cray still laments that so many young black people reject
the blues and classic soul.
"Yeah, that still bothers me,'' said Cray. "A lot of young black people unfortunately still view
this stuff as their 'parents music.' Kids
understandably want their own music, but I think the classic stuff has a lot
more soul than most of what kids listen to today.''
1/22/06
Source: MLive.com
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