Blues-rock guitarist and singer-songwriter Joanne Shaw Taylor (JST) telegraphs her album theme or approach as directly as any artist. Heavy Soul is her twelfth release, and like 2021’s The Blues Album, she tells us straight out what she is aiming for. This is the first time she’s worked with renowned producer Kevin Shirley. Together, they recruited a bunch of Nashville ‘cats,” some of whom you often see on Americana releases, such as Doug Lancio, Anton Fig, Allison Presswood, Jimmy Wallace, and Rob McNelly. JST also worked with co-writers on three tracks, mostly notably Beth Nielson-Chapman on the single “Change of Heart.” The album appears on Joe Bonamassa’s Journeyman Records, but unlike her past few albums, Bonamassa is absent here. Along with seven originals either penned by or co-written by JST, there are covers of tunes by Gamble & Huff, Joan Armatrading, and Van Morrison.
JST made her mark as one of the unique and engaging guitarists in blues-rock. Her singular style sets her apart from the rest in the field, which is often bogged down in cliches, over shredding, and overreaching. Her spiraling, exploratory solos have long impressed this listener. In recent years though, she has moved a bit closer to the blues and to a singer-songwriter posture. We could call this her ‘singer-songwriter’ album because recording in RCA Studio A in Nashville just breathes those strains within those hallowed walls.
Original “Sweet ‘Lil Lies” kicks off with a couple of stanzas of guitar before we hear JST singing to a stomping beat backed by a cadre of four vocalists (it’s a soul album, after all). She launches a crisp, soaring guitar solo, over angry frustrated lyrics that leave her exhausted and exasperated (“Sweet little lies/That you keep hiding behind.”) The lustily strummed Armatrading’s “All The Way From America” is an anthemic roots-rock song, imbued by swirling organ and again a swelling chorus of backgrounds. “Black Magic” veers toward gospel with the call-and-response sequences between JST and the background vocalists and rousing piano from Wallace as JST sings with authority and conviction, even though she’s dealing with a polarizing situation – “These days are so strange, mellow to manic/I swear that boy’s black magic.” Again, the guitar is powerful but in service to the song, unlike earlier in her career when the roles were reversed.
She reaches back for a soul chestnut, Gamble & Huff’s “Drowning in a Sea of Love,” a big hit for Joe Simon in 1972. She sings expressively, and the guitar solo is succinct and on target, but some elements of the accompaniment take the ‘drowning’ a bit too far, creating more density than necessary. Yet her own “A Good Goodbye” is a terrific bouncy soul number with the background vocalists adding that sweet touch. The title track is a preeminent example of melding the blues-rock approach with soulful pop. Still, this one strays into stratospheric guitar territory, reminding us of those immense guitar chops but not measuring up to other tracks in terms of infectiousness. “Devil In Me” is of the same ilk. “Wild Love” motors along nicely and explodes into a fiery guitar excursion, and the incessant “We’ve got wild love” combined with the searing guitar makes it a keeper for live performance.
Van Morrison’s “Someone Like You” hails from his 1987 Poetic Champions Compose, presaging his gospel period, and JST renders it with a healthy amount of vigor and soul, abetted by the background vocalists and stellar keyboards from Wallace, easily one of her better vocals. She saved one of the better songs for last. You may have heard “Change of Heart,” written by Beth Nielsen Chapman (Bonnie Raitt, Willie Nelson, Trisha Yearwood). “I’m going to try a change of heart/The one I got caused too much sorrow/It’ll be good, baby, by tomorrow.” It meshes all the elements as well as any of these tracks: heated guitar, impassioned vocals, catchy lyrics, and a swell of background vocalists. The tune evokes Delaney & Bonnie, and the closing guitar spot, the late Dickey Betts. Those are likely just coincidental, however.
Though not flawless, this is the most complete ‘triple threat” effort yet from Joanne Shaw Taylor. It elevates her status from terrific guitar slinger to singer-songwriter in one fell swoop.
