Shine Eye Dee & The Bad Fish - Shine Eye Dee & The Bad Fish

Bitrate: 320K/s
Year: 2016
Time: 39:24
Size: 92,0 MB
Label: Self Released
Styles: Blues/Blues Rock
Art: Front

Tracks Listing:
 1. Ride - 3:00
 2. Problem Child - 6:25
 3. Lights in the Sky - 3:28
 4. Pretty Baby - 3:33
 5. Midnight Hoochie Coo - 4:00
 6. Flotsam and Jetsam - 4:35
 7. Lonely Highway - 4:38
 8. Hey Boy - 3:23
 9. Cheatin' Blues - 6:18

I have no hesitation in nominating this album as one the most outstanding blues/rock albums of 2015. Manchester based studio producer and musician Geoff Rees is the creative driving force behind the music and manages to make every track a winner, there simply isn’t an inferior track amongst this excellent collection of songs. The icing on the cake surely has to be the superb vocal talents of Shine-Eye Dee who has a sultry but powerful and distinctive vocal presence on all the tracks. Her vocals are perfect for this music and she pitches her voice with pure emotion and precise tonal quality into each song, the hallmark of a true vocal artist.
“Ride” opens the album with a truck stop boogie 'power glider' and takes the listener into the badlands of Arizona & New Mexico which sets the scene for things to come with the following track “Outlaw Man” telling story of an old western gun fighter on the run, perhaps an ode to Wild Bill Longley with Shine-Eye Dee slowly tightening the noose on the song before the outlaw finally mounts the gallows to meet his maker. “Problem Child” is defined by Geoff’s low down mean & dirty blues riff which sucks the listener into the age old tale of forlorn and doomed infatuation with a feel and sound production reminiscent of the Alannah Myles classic “Black Velvet”.
“Pretty Baby” is in my opinion the “single” on this album with a totally hypnotic rock guitar riff that nails it to the mast from the very first note with a killer middle eight bridge section and vocals to die for from Shine-Eye Dee, this song has total instant appeal.
“Perfect Circumstance” has a flow all of its own and is an inspired mid tempo bitter sweet country rock song which touches the listener with positive sentiment raising the spirit whilst exposing an almost fatalistic flaw within the ideal of the songs theme and title. “Midnight Hoochie Coo” is an 'out and out' good time rocker with a great mix of guitar and piano with a powerful gutsy vocal delivery, a real foot stomper. “Cheatin’ Blues” is an earthy slow burner in a similar vein to “Trouble” the Leiber & Stoller classic recorded by Elvis. The song “You Are” finds Shine-Eye Dee vocalizing on this laid back track in a higher register pitch with strong Southern Rock overtones augmented with some very atmospheric guitar playing by Geoff Rees.
The ace up the sleeve here is “Flotsam & Jetsam” which is the real ‘chill factor ten’ song on this album as it touches the inner sanctum of the soul with the sadness of loss and a life unfulfilled, backed by just piano & violin Shine-Eye Dee’s haunting and melancholic voice brings the listener to their knees as broken dreams and memories come flooding back to haunt us. Stone statues will lie weeping in the wake of this song, pure genius!
“Lonely Highway” is a Freeway fast lane rocker that puts you back in the driving seat but I would be more than happy to travel down this highway with Shine-Eye Dee & The Bad Fish which I do every time I hear this album, after all isn’t that what good music is supposed to do, transport the listener. It’s all here in one album, great songs delivered with real emotion, hats off to Shine-Eye Dee & The Bad Fish. It just doesn’t get any better than this! ~Lucas Campbell

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