Bobby Rush\u20262017 and 2021 GRAMMY winning blues legend, Blues Hall of Famer, 12x Blues Music Award winner, B.B. King Entertainer of the Year, and makes a cameo in the Netflix Original \u2018Dolemite Is My Name\u2019 Starring Eddie Murphy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After decades of tearing up the chitlin\u2019 circuit on a nightly basis with his sweaty, no-holds-barred funkfests, Bobby has thoroughly broken through to the mainstream. He won a long-overdue 2017 Grammy for his spectacular album Porcupine Meat and consistently tours the globe as a headliner. What\u2019s more, Bobby\u2019s brand-new album Sitting on Top of the Blues on his own Deep Rush imprint (distributed by Thirty Tigers) promises to further spread the news that this revered legend, well past 80 years of age even if his stratospheric energy level belies the calendar, is bigger and badder and bolder than ever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI\u2019m sitting on top of the blues. I\u2019m a bluesman who\u2019s sitting on the top of my game, proud of what I do and proud of who I am and thankful for people accepting me for what I am and who I am,\u201d says the charismatic Rush. \u201cI\u2019m happy about what I\u2019m doing and still enthused about what I\u2019m doing. And I think we\u2019ve got some good songs.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That\u2019s a profound understatement. There\u2019s something for everyone on Sitting on Top of the Blues, from the boisterous R&B-laced opener \u201cHey Hey Bobby Rush\u201d through the cooking \u201cGood Stuff,\u201d the sexy \u201cSlow Motion,\u201d and a stripped-down \u201cRecipe For Love\u201d that features Bobby and his co-producer Vasti Jackson supplying all the accompaniment necessary with their interlocking guitars. Rush wails on pungent harmonica throughout the set, his vocals as sly and sensuous as ever while elastic grooves simmer and surge behind him. Rush has been a master storyteller for decades, and the songs on this disc follow in that tradition.
Never one to rest on his considerable laurels, Bobby\u2019s not about to start now. \u201cI think I\u2019m getting more acclaim because I\u2019m working harder, and when people tell me I can\u2019t do something, that\u2019s the wrong thing to tell Bobby Rush,\u201d he says. \u201cI\u2019m considered the king of the chitlin\u2019 circuit. I\u2019m crossing over now, but I haven\u2019t crossed out. And I think the music itself says that about me.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Scott Billington, producer of Porcupine Meat for Rounder Records, was involved this time too, though to a lesser extent as Rush recruited the multi-talented Jackson to help with much of the action behind the board. \u201cI wanted to come with a record behind winning a Grammy,\u201d says the veteran bluesman. \u201cSo we went and finished it up.\u201d The album spotlights all of Rush\u2019s strengths: blues, soul, funk, and everything in between.
\u201cThat\u2019s about the truth of me,\u201d he says of his new disc. \u201cThat\u2019s all I know. Even if I do something different, I\u2019m going to put enough blues in it so you\u2019ll know that I\u2019m still this blues singer that\u2019s giving you what I know about it. Anything I do or say is going to be about the blues. So that\u2019s where I was coming from with that. It\u2019s got a lot of little twists. It\u2019s got a little of this, a little of that. And I often talk about how I came up and who did I love and who influenced me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI think the first one was my daddy, as a preacher. And the next person was Louis Jordan. I respect Little Walter, because he was a good, slick harmonica player. Sonny Boy Williamson, I like the way he plays harp, and I like the way he delivers his songs and writes the songs,\u201d Rush continues. \u201cI like Howlin\u2019 Wolf because he was good and he was different because of the voice he had. I also like Bobby Bland, the way he kind of squawked with a soft voice. And I like B.B. King and respected B.B. And I like Junior Parker because he was so smooth and slick with what he done. I guess you can find about 20 guys that I like, and when you hear my music, you can hear a little of this, a little of that, a little up, a little down. You put \u2019em all in a bowl and stir \u2019em up, you get a Bobby Rush. That\u2019s called a Bobby Rush blues soup.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n