Ben Harper and Charlie Musselwhite, No Mercy In This Land Review

Blues

Ben Harper and Charlie Musselwhite, No Mercy In This Land Review 2The dynamic blues duo of Ben Harper and Charlie Musselwhite are back with an album titled, No Mercy In This Land. This is the highly anticipated follow-up to their 2013 collaboration, Get Up!, and the duet has built a musical framework that is fun, emotional, dynamic and most importantly, musical respect and friendship. The two present as special blend of blues that is firmly established in the tradition, but still pushes to new sonic territory. Harper’s songwriting is as strong as ever, the three-time Grammy winner has written songs that speak of emotional truth and maintains the feeling that is essential to great blues. Harper and Musselwhite continue to bring us blues with feeling that furthers the legacy, while still maintaining that undeniable rightful blues sound. That’s the short of it!

Positives:

Prodigious songwriting, singing and playing. The harmonica legend Musselwhite's, now 74 years old, playing is absolutely inspired!

Bottom Line:

Get Up! earned the duo a Grammy Award for Best Blues Album and there is no doubt No Mercy In This Land will do the same. Five years have passed since Get Up! was released, their reuniting has brought us a personal and sonically rich album. The thirteen tracks on No Mercy In This Land deal with the history of American struggle and survival, but done with intent on keeping the true meaning of the blues and the emotions it conveys. This is the real deal y'all.

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