Showing posts with label Chico Banks. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Chico Banks. Show all posts

Friday, March 21, 2025

Chico Banks - Stray Kitty Kat

Album: Stray Kitty Kat
Size: 133,8 MB
Time: 57:57
File: MP3 @ 320K/s
Released: 2008
Styles: Blues/Funk/Soul mix
Art: Front, inside, tray

1. Sacrifice (3:48)
2. Five Long Years (5:33)
3. Travlin' Man (4:05)
4. Why Are You So Mean To Me (6:25)
5. I'm Leaving Home (3:42)
6. Stray Kitty Kat (5:16)
7. Bad Luck (4:10)
8. Mercy, Mercy, Mercy (6:12)
9. My Babe (4:38)
10. Revelation (5:30)
11. Big Leg Woman With A Short Short Miniskirt (4:26)
12. Martel (4:08)

Along with Bernard Allison, Melvin Taylor and a handful of others, guitarist, singer and songwriter Chico Banks is part of the new generation of Chicago blues players who are expanding the boundaries of this often maligned, misunderstood music. Like Allison and Taylor, and even older Southern musicians like Larry Garner and Sherman Robertson, Banks focuses on good-time, upbeat blues.

Banks' music may not impress blues purists - he freely mixes in elements of soul, funk and rock - but when a musical form remains too static, as the late Luther Allison would say, it loses its vibrancy. He credits influences from a mixed bag of artists from the 1960s and '70s: "Magic Sam" Maghett, Buddy Guy, Albert King, Jimi Hendrix, Otis Clay, George Benson and Tyrone Davis. But his playing also reflects the contribution of jazz pianist Ahmad Jamal, and the funk of Prince, the Isley Brothers, the Ohio Players and Parliament/Funkadelic. Also not to be overlooked is his father, Jesse Banks, who played with the gospel group the Mighty Clouds of Joy.

Since joining his first band, a Top 40 cover group, at 14, Banks has performed with Johnny Christian, Evidence labelmate Melvin Taylor, Buddy Guy, Otis Clay, James Cotton, Artie "Blues Boy" White, Little Milton, Magic Slim, Big Time Sarah, Chick Rogers and most recently, Mavis Staples. Banks' sessionography includes albums by Willie Kent, Freddie Roulette and Pops Staples.

On his 1997 debut, Candy Lickin' Man, Banks is joined by the great gospel singer Mavis Staples, who also contributes liner notes. Although only in his 20s, Banks is already a veteran song interpreter; he covers classics like "Groove Me," "Got to Be Some Changes Made" and "The Sky Is Crying," putting his own individual stamp on each tune. /Biography by Richard Skelly, AllMusic

Stray Kitty Kat mc
Stray Kitty Kat gofile

Sunday, March 16, 2025

Chico Banks - Candy Lickin' Man

Album: Candy Lickin' Man
Size: 157,8 MB
Time: 68:25
File: MP3 @ 320K/s
Released: 1997
Styles: Blues/Funk/Soul mix
Art: Full

1. Red Dress (5:01)
2. Candy Lickin' Man (5:20)
3. Down The Road I Go (3:54)
4. It Must Be Love (4:15)
5. Angel Of Mercy (5:07)
6. Soul Serenade (6:12)
7. All Your Love (5:53)
8. Careless Things We Do (4:13)
9. Got To Be Some Changes Made (4:53)
10. You're Fine (3:39)
11. Groove Me (4:48)
12. The Sky Is Crying (5:09)
13. Truck Load Of Lovin' (4:54)
14. Call My Job (5:02)

When Chico Banks played guitar with the Staple Singers, his playing was hard, uncluttered, and straight to the point, yet it was tempered to fit right in with the Staples' sound. Banks' father Jessie was with the Mighty Clouds of Joy and also a bluesman, and his brother Stanley Banks is a keyboardist, with whom he co-wrote two of these songs. His playing is influenced by blues, rhythm & blues, gospel, and the psychedelia of Jimi Hendrix, especially on his tasty, never burdensome use of the wah-wah pedal. His voice is more than adequate for the job, but the cuts that stand out are those on which he concentrates on his guitar.

On "It Must Be Love," Mavis Staples does the vocals, and you can feel the electricity between the two born of a mutual respect for excellence. On "All Your Love," he has "Big James" Montgomery handling the vocals and lets loose some fine playing through that wah-wah pedal. This is one of the finest guitar players to come down the avenue in a good stretch, and he can only mature from here. This is no throwaway first album, with one good cut and lots of dross; its nearly 70 minutes are filled with some mighty fine playing. /Bob Gottlieb, AllMusic

(For personnel details, see artwork included.)

Candy Lickin' Man mc
Candy Lickin' Man gofile