If there is a problem in procesing orders via the add to cart tab you can order directly by e-mail (link on the right) and a Payal promt will be sent to you. You do not need to be a Paypal member just a holder of a credit/debit card. Many thanks-Slim

FOR WHEN I LAY IT DOWN (2010)

(21^stCentury Blues)

Is a collection of country-blues songs incorporating Slims Tin-Tone 5 string "Doodlebugger" guitar. 'Howdeedoodee Hiya! showcases this primitive banjo sounding instrument as well as the haunting 'Blackwater Rain' and 'I Went Down To The Riverside', a gospel paean to those grand old foes, redemption and resurrection.

The opening track 'No More Tears Have I Left To Cry' highlights the tug between old and new country-blues that pepper this album with It's dobro-flamenco style guitar lament. This sets the tone for the uplifting darkness that lies within and this is followed by the title track that showcases Slim's lyrical and melodic muse which is echoed by the twangy shimmer of 'When I Get Low I've Got To Get High', already a crowd favourite.

'No Reward' and 'Junkshop Boogie' are driving romps that tail spin this album with the latter calling upon the spirit and insanity of the recently departed Captain Beefheart...”it's gonna boogalize ya”!

The Southdowners include the harmonica blowing brilliance of West Weston who contributes to classics like 16 Tonnes and St. James Infirmary as well as many others and is backed by the solid rhythm section of Orlando Shearer (ex Otis Grand, James Hunter and Cadillac Kings) who thumps the bull-fiddle bass with Chicken Skin Schultz (ex Swamp Thing) adding drums and percussion.

Slims motto is “mindful of the future with one foot in the past”-21^st Century Blues. Refreshing 'For When I Lay It Down' is revivalist and reverential it is not, now how did that cotton pickin' ukulele blues go?

SOULCRAFT (2009)

This is an expansive electro-gospel blues album with the full fat driving sound of The Southdowners which showcases Slim's 21st century blues style and philosophy. Tracks include Hold It Tight, I've Got So Much Soul, Heaven Can Wait & Talk To Me. Read the review below....

                                                               Slim Lightfoot
                                                                   Soulcraft
 
 "Mutated blues for the 21st century" is Slims motto and Soulcraft affirms this with a blistering trawl through the deep and dark depths of his blues psyche. If your looking for that revivalist sound then look away now as this is not an album for your average footapping blues mingler. This album lyrically conjures up a palette that is in touch with todays language and social mores. "Do some t'ai-chi, less alcohol more herbal tea, those panic attacks are psychosomatic, relax" on 'Heaven can wait', tells the story of modern anxities regarding ones health where we are all too informed on our "condition" via the media of the internet. The jug/blow-bottle breathing underpins the black humour that lies within this song and others, frivolous its not.

The album opens up with a dual entwinned track, 'Soulcraft/Make perfect contact with me', which points to the main themes of birth, death and resurrection that pepper this CD, the latter sounding like gospel-twang as played by The Doors. There's the bravado of 'I've got so much soul' preclaiming that, "This jitterbug blues is gonna make you sing, throw in the whole damn rhythm with the kitchen sink". 'Hold it tight' and 'Shoot the dog' deal with the concerns of recession and passive consumption as seen through the medium of 'YouTube' and the red top newspapers, observing open mouthed as "your credit card number runs downstream" as "Some define themselves by what they have, the haves and have-nots are what they truly spend".
 
Side two opens with a Creedence/Crazy Horse style stomp on the dangers of fatal attractions, whilst 'Down on the turnpike' revels and despairs about the machinations of the financial markets and its protractors, "we're all impaled now" . What's a blues album without a gambling song? That could be said of the last one but, 'I've got my best suit on' is a garage-blues rumble that throws all the chips in the air and still comes out laughing! Inbetween, 'Made man' tremors with rattlesnake percussion about the age old battle between good and evil blurred by moral concerns. 'Talk to me baby' is a guilty as charged Phil Spector country rocker that has canyons of emotional charge spitting from it and the final sombre track, 'I don't need nobody' has a droning violin mimicking the existentialist sound of loss and loneliness but still feels all the better for it.
 
Ultimately this an album that will appeal to old and new fans alike as it traverses the styles of delta-blues-garage and r'n'b blues with a folksy country rock sound within. 'Soulcraft' is not a showbizzy album but what it does do is showcase Slim Lightfoot's restless song-writing spirit and brings blues music kicking and screaming into the new decade alive with the intent to unsettle and to entertain you for all of its forty odd non filler minutes.

Chuck Werner (Blues Life-March 2010)

ORIGINAL NUGGET BLUES (2003-07)

Is a best of CD incorporating four of Slim's previous albums spanning the years 2003-07. 18 Tracks including, Rag Mama, Standing On The Banks, Bad Storms A Coming & Chicken Legs. Also includes six instrumentals and The Montpelier Gospel Choir.

Reviews for STANDING ON THE BANKS OF THE MIGHTY BLUES (2004) & DUST BOWL SOUP (2004) which feature heavily on ORIGINAL NUGGET BLUES.

As both these albums were released in 2004, it is tempting to think of them as two sides of the same recording. However, it is more accurate for them to be viewed as totally separate Blues bookends of Slim Lightfoot’s not inconsiderable talents.

"Standing On The Banks Of The Mighty Blues" is a slightly malevolent collection, while "Dust Bowl Soup" contains many moments that go a long way to rehabilitating a much-maligned form – the instrumental. You wouldn’t imagine that there is anything more you could extract from ‘I Just Want To Make Love To You’, the second track on "Standing….", but Lightfoot isolates it and turns it from an entreaty into a seductive threat here and accurately sets the tone. This is an album that is constantly gripping and at times spine-tinglingly good, even the rustic instrumental ‘Marching My Way Back Home’ comes with an unspoken but ever-present threat. On "Standing….", Lightfoot shows himself to be respectful of the Blues but not reverential. He kneads and moulds ‘The Southern Rain’ into a country Blues hybrid that is his alone.

"Dust Bowl Soup" offers a neat contrast to its predecessor. Freed from the need to carry lyrics, Lightfoot allows the music to roam, seemingly at will. The frankly bizarre ‘Rag ‘n’ Drones No. 1’ would seem out of place on a normal album but here it’s right at home. Again because of the absence of lyrics, "Dust Bowl Soup" is a much more visual album. ‘Slingback’, for one, conjures up images and begins a journey that is as impossible as the desert landscape it evokes. Wedged in between ‘words’, instrumentals can come across as almost lightweight pieces of filler but here, each track drives the album on, allowing it develop and flourish. On both albums, Slim Lightfoot shows himself to be both an innovator and an explorer, constantly looking to see where he can take his beloved music next. Wherever it may be it’s sure to be one hell of a ride!

Michael Mee – Blues Matters! Aug / Sept ‘06