| When Lightnin' Struck the Pine | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | ||||
| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | 2002 | |||
| Genre | Blues | |||
| Label | Fast Horse | |||
| Producer | Joe Cripps | |||
| CeDell Davis chronology | ||||
| ||||
When Lightnin' Struck the Pine is an album by the American musician CeDell Davis, released in 2002. [1] [2] It was released through Fast Horse Recordings, a label co-owned by some of the members of Davis's backing band. [3] Davis supported the album with a North American tour. [4]
Recorded in Dallas and Denton, Texas, the album was produced by Joe Cripps. [5] [6] Davis was backed by the band Tuatara; he was leery of creating a "primitive blues" sound, and desired the bigger sound of a full band. [7] Davis used a butter knife as his guitar slide. [8] "Woke Up This Morning" is a cover of the B. B. King song. [9] "So Long, I Hate to See You Go" is a version of Lowell Fulson's "Reconsider Baby". [10]
| Review scores | |
|---|---|
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |   [11] |
| Chicago Sun-Times |  [12] |
| Robert Christgau | B+ [13] |
| The Penguin Guide to Blues Recordings | [9] |
| Pittsburgh Post-Gazette | [14] |
Robert Christgau concluded that "it'll sure stick to your ribs longer than what Jon Spencer stewed up with R.L. Burnside—long enough to take you back to Davis's 1994 Fat Possum comp." [13] The Chicago Tribune opined that, "despite some funny muttered-word asides, the record is a little too clean and professional, and Davis holds back instead of asserting his slurred- around-the-edges personality." [15] The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette said that "the results are deep blue notes twisted and bent to the breaking point, reshaped into surrealistically ragged tones and released to forge otherworldly harmonics." [14]
AllMusic wrote that "it's a glorious, defiant celebration of Mississippi blues, recalling Muddy Waters more than, say, Junior Kimbrough in the deep Delta mud that sticks around greasy tracks like 'Pay to Play' or the closing instrumental 'Hold Me Baby'." [11] In 2012, the Dallas Observer listed When Lightnin' Struck the Pine as one of the "Top Ten North Texas Blues Albums", deeming it "a fairly authentic slab of electrified Delta blues." [16]
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Pay to Play" | |
| 2. | "Come On and Ride with Me" | |
| 3. | "Woke Up This Morning" | |
| 4. | "So Long, I Hate to See You Go" | |
| 5. | "Give Me That Look" | |
| 6. | "Love Me a Little While" | |
| 7. | "Cold Chills" | |
| 8. | "One of These Days" | |
| 9. | "Propaganda" | |
| 10. | "Rub Me Baby" | |
| 11. | "Hold Me Baby" |
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Slide guitar is a technique for playing the guitar that is often used in blues music. It involves playing a guitar while holding a hard object against the strings, creating the opportunity for glissando effects and deep vibratos that reflect characteristics of the human singing voice. It typically involves playing the guitar in the traditional position with the use of a slide fitted on one of the guitarist's fingers. The slide may be a metal or glass tube, such as the neck of a bottle, giving rise to the term bottleneck guitar to describe this type of playing. The strings are typically plucked while the slide is moved over the strings to change the pitch. The guitar may be placed on the player's lap and played with a hand-held bar.
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