Bobby Rush - Show You a Good Time

Deep Rush Records

http://www.bobbyrush.net

11 songs; 44 minutes

Styles: Modern Electric Blues, Funk, Soul, Acoustic Blues

Southern gentleman Bobby Rush is, without a doubt, one of the most flamboyant entertainers on today's blues scene. He is also an ambassador of good will and racial harmony. Total package: he is a national treasure.

Whether one listens to him live (complete with jovial and gyrating dancing girls!) or via one of his nine (at least) previous albums, the clear impression one receives is that Bobby presents several truths about blues music. To this reviewer's mind, the tireless 70-something-year-old Rush believes that the best blues is sincere, pointed, and, most of all, fun, especially if one enjoys his brand of overtly sexual fun. Lyrically, Rush is from the Son House school on blues: “it’s what happens between a man and a woman.” Rush's tenth release, “Show You a Good Time,” surely accomplishes what its title sets out to do!

Across the eleven original tracks, Bobby sings, swings, and plays harp and guitar with just keyboards, bass, and drums/percussion in support. That formula usually results in heart pumping, metronome-like rhythms that defy gravity.

Some most notable among the great numbers:
Track 2: “Sniffer”--According to this funky and hilarious ditty, a “sniffer” is a man who (amongst all his sniffing) inspects his woman's clothes with his nose after she's been out for the evening and has gone to bed. “Where's she been, and what's she been doing?” Such questions can apparently be answered through the olfactory apparatus! Rush calls out several “sniffers,” including (presumably absent) Eric Clapton, B.B. King, and Buddy Guy. “There are two kinds of sniffers in the world, I know,” Rush states: “the one that say he do, and the other one say he don't!”

Track 3: “My Friend”--With pals like the one Bobby describes here, who needs enemies? He slyly and slowly sings of a cad who “eat my chicken and drinking my tea—now he's trying to take my woman from me. Do you call that a friend?” “No, no,” answers a sly chorus. Fair enough. Following a harp solo, when Rush nonchalantly asks if he should shoot/stab/poison “my friend, because my friend's trying to do me in,” their voices softly prompt, “Yeah, yeah.” Is this song funny or creepy? The unsettling answer is that it's both, simultaneously!

Bonus Track [#11]: “Jody Didn't Take Your Woman”--As explained in the earliest part of this song, “Jody” could be anyone: “your cousin, your closest kin, your next-door neighbor or your best friend.” Regardless, cheating men, “Jody” attends to your inamorata while you're “running round town with your pants unzipped.” Don't blame Jody for “taking your woman—you gave her to him!” Clever and catchy, this dance inducer puts the “bonus” in “bonus track.”

Bobby Rush wants to “Show You a Good Time.” Take him up on his offer, whether you're a male or female blues fan, because this studio CD is Rush’s best and most accessible work in recent years!.