Joe Bonamassa - Dust Bowl

180 Gram Vinyl! The Hardest Working Blues-Rock Guitarist of the 21st Century! Stylistic Depth & Emotional Resonance!

As Joe Bonamassa grows his reputation as one of the world's greatest guitar players, he is also evolving into a charismatic blues-rock star and singer-songwriter of stylistic depth and emotional resonance. His ability to connect with live concert audiences is transformational.

In May '09, he played to a sold out crowd at London's Royal Albert Hall, arguably the most prestigious concert venue in the world. During the show, Bonamassa's hero, Eric Clapton, joined him on stage for a joint-performance of Clapton's hit "Further On Up The Road." London's The Independent said about the show, "The man has arrived, and there's no turning back."

In 2009, Joe was awarded the Breakthrough Artist of the Year Award at the U.K.'s prestigious Classic Rock Roll of Honour Awards and Classic Rock magazine has said, "They're calling him the future of blues, but they're wrong – Joe Bonamassa is the present; so fresh and of his time that he almost defines it." He was also named Best Blues Guitarist in Guitar Player Magazine's 2009 Readers' Choice Awards for the third consecutive year. Guitar Player writer Matt Blackett has said, "He's an old soul, and that comes through in his bends, vibrato, singing voice, and note choices, which – with each passing year – get more restrained and refined."

2009 also marked Bonamassa's twentieth year as a professional musician, an extraordinary timeline for a young artist just into his '30s. A child prodigy, Bonamassa was finessing Stevie Ray Vaughan licks when he was seven and by the time he was ten, had caught B.B. King's ear. After first hearing him play, King said, "This kid's potential is unbelievable. He hasn't even begun to scratch the surface. He's one of a kind." By age 12, Bonamassa was opening shows for the blues icon and went on to tour with venerable acts including Buddy Guy, Foreigner, Robert Cray, Stephen Stills, Joe Cocker and Gregg Allman.

"Joe Bonamassa, the hardest working blues-rock guitarist of the 21st century, strikes up a bit of a smoky Black Keys vibe, signaling that he's not quite as devoted to the past as he may initially seem. It's not the only trick he has up his sleeve, either. Appropriately enough for an album entitled Dust Bowl, Bonamassa kicks up some country dirt on this record, enlisting John Hiatt for a duet on the songwriter's 'Tennessee Plates' and bringing Vince Gill in to play on the lazy shuffle 'Sweet Rowena.' These are accents to an album that otherwise sticks to Bonamassa's strong suit of blues in the vein of Cream, Stevie Ray, and Gary Moore, but it's just enough of a difference to give Dust Bowl a distinctive flavor and suggests that the guitarist's constant work is pushing him to synthesize his clear influences into something that is uniquely his own." - Stephen Thomas Erlewine, allmusic.com

Features:
• 180 Gram Vinyl
• Import LP

Selections:
Side A:
1. Slow Train
2. Dust Bowl
3. Tennessee Plates (with John Hiatt)
4. The Meaning of the Blues
5. Black Lung Heartache
6. You Better Watch Yourself
Side B:
1. The Last Matador of Bayonne
2. Heartbreaker (with Glenn Hughes)
3. No Love On the Street
4. The Whale That Swallowed Jonah
5. Sweet Rowena (with Vince Gill)
6. Prisoner