CD REVIEW: BILL DURST – Good Good Lovin

CD REVIEW: BILL DURST – Good Good Lovin
Durstwerks Recordings
20 November, 2015
Reviewed by Shane Pinnegar
8 ½ /10

 

Bill Durst is a big man with a big reputation and a big, big guitar tone, and he hits a self-described “musical sweet spot” on fifth solo album Good Good Lovin.

The Ontario native – an inductee of the London Music Hall Of Fame as a member of seminal ‘70s Canadian boogie rockers Thundermug – taps his post-Thundermug years as a member of ZZ Top tribute band Tres Hombres for this album which has more than a passing stylistic resemblance to the iconic guitar playing and vocals of ZZ’s Billy Gibbons.

Title track Good Good Lovin opens the show, with a nod to Jeff Beck’s sixties style, and on 21st Century Blues Durst sounds like he could actually BE Gibbons, such is the resemblance. But rest assured the imposing Durst is no copycat: this is all him, and it rocks fierce and sharp.

Holding up the back end on this blues-rocking ride across the desert are bassist Joe DeAngelis, the original singer for Thundermug and co-writer of all nine tracks here, and drummer Corey Thompson.

Heaven Heaven is an irresistible dusty shuffle, King Snake Prowl is another trip to the ZZ Top universe with some incendiary guitar work from Durst, which culminates is a whirlwind of sirens and “watch outs” and a warning rattle to great effect.

What Could Have Been Love occupies the common ground between Gibbons and Hendrix, a scorching slower blues that sends sparks flying, and Northern Electric’s riffing boogie is a good time waiting to happen, and even includes a little Canadian geography lesson!

The album closes in fine fashion with the country-flecked blues of I Regret To Say, a sad lament that will have you reaching for your lighter (or mobile phone, nowadays) and wiping away a tear.

Category: CD Reviews