There must be something in the water in Austin Texas. Good guitar players always seem to be from Austin or have some Austin connection. Jake Andrews comes from a musical family (his father, John "Toad" Andrews played with Mother Earth) and he was known as "Little" Jake Andrews for a long time. He has dropped (or outgrown) the "Little" tag and now is competing with Jonny Lang and Kenny Wayne Shepherd.
"Time To Burn" is an excellent Austin Texas inspired blues CD. The sound and style is a lot like early Ian Moore when he was doing rocking blues instead of the folky style he is doing today. The CD opens with the title cut 'Time To Burn', a solid rockin song. 'Just You and Me' is another rocker, with a Chuck Berry style rhythm. 'You've Got To Know' is solid Austin style where the vocal trades phrases with guitar licks. 'Lover to Cry' has a distinct jazzy sound to it, with some tasty guitar licks sprinkled throughout the song. Stylistically, the music is quite diverse. 'I'm Glad For Your Sake (but Sorry For Mine)' is a song straight out of the late 50's doo-wop style. The music while staying within the genre of blues throws in bits and pieces of rock and jazz to make it interesting. The song writers list looks like a who's who of Austin blues with players/writers such as David Grissom, Doyle Bramhall and more.
Bottom line - this is an excellent CD, full of good Texas style blues music. One nice thing about this CD is that it does NOT sound like it was done by a Stevie Ray Vaughan clone. There are too many players out there that don't know the difference between 'inspired by' and 'copy of'. Jake Andrews does know the difference. If you like Texas style blues, then you should pick this CD up.
Jake Andrews - Guitar & Vocals
Tommy Taylor - Drums & Backing Vocals
Mike Sconce - Bass & backing vocals (on 'Hard Way' & 'You've Got To Know')
Jon Blondel - Bass (on all other titles)
Guest appearances by:
Doug Sahm - Piano
Jon Cleary - Piano
Tommy Eyre - Keyboards
The Texacali Horns
This review is copyright © 1999 by Robert T. Murphy, and Blues On Stage, all rights reserved.
