A BluesWax Reprint

This review originally ran in

BluesWax #223 on Feb 10, 2005

Point Blank Blues Band

7

BluesWax Rating: 5 out of 10

Blues from the Balkans



This is kind of an unusual disc, a little out of the ordinary, but has some definite merits. It's electric Blues, but with a twist - throw in a little World music, some Folk, and add a dash of electronica. It's driven by guitars, and lots of them, and owes a heavy debt to the North Mississippi Hill Country. 

Lyrically, it's reminiscent of acid-induced beat poetry. That sounds like I'm making fun, but I'm not. At the outset, in the spoken intro to the first track, it attributes the origin of the Blues to primeval "furry creatures" who lived between the dinosaurs, but before the invention of language. (Hey, I just report it!) Concept albums are ambitious and hard to carry out successfully and I won't say that Dr. Project-Point Blank does it all that well, but if you look past that minor issue, there are some good tunes here. 



Early on, some of the tracks falter a little trying to find their pace. On the first half of the disc, several tracks have a sudden change of tempo or sometimes a total change of styles within the same song. By the middle of the disc the band seems to have hit its stride and is able to deliver some pretty solid numbers. 



Highlights: Track 5 (no name, as it was an advance promo disc with the label handwritten with a red Sharpie) starts off with some sort of primordial moans for almost a minute before switching to a fast Rock riff. Before long, it changes to a slow, grinding Blues and then finishes by switching back to the fast Rock riff. But in the middle, this piece shows just how good this band can be. 



"My Friend and I" seems to be a witty tribute to a bunch of classic Rock songs, with what I think are allusions to Bob Dylan, Led Zeppelin, Elvis, and maybe Arlo Guthrie. Either that or else I'm the one rambling on like an acid-influenced beat poet. 



When you think of the Blues you don't often think of Belgrade, Serbia (you might remember it as Yugoslavia). Not to get all philosophical up in here, but this seems to say something about the fact that music is universal. Despite its shortcomings - kind of strange lyrics and a number of unexpected changes - there are some high spots, including a lot of really great guitar work on this disc. 



Eric Wrisley is a contributing editor at BluesWax



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