blues.the-butcher-590213 + Yoko Utsumi “Blues Before Sunrise” CD

Takashi Nagai, Hisashi Numazawa, Taku Nakajo, and KOTEZ = Blues the Butcher. A new album with Yoko Utsumi as a guest again!

Blues the Butcher is one of Japan's leading blues combos, consisting of Nagai "Hotoke" Takashi (vo/g), Numazawa Hisashi (ds), Nakajo Taku (b), and KOTEZ (hca/vo). This is their ninth new album dedicated to the great drummer Earl Palmer, born in New Orleans! With Utsumi Yoko (formerly of Mescaline Drive and Soul Flower Union) as a guest again, they cover a number of classic songs that would not have been created without Earl Palmer's backbeat, from New Orleans artists such as Professor Longhair and Smiley Lewis to Elmore James and Etta James, in a BTB style! You can't talk about GROOVE MUSIC without listening to this!

Dixieland jazz was born in New Orleans based on blues, brass band marches and ragtime... The snare drum's "afterbeat" always appears at the end of the song... The first time this was powerfully played from the beginning to the end of the song was in FATS DOMINO's "THE FAT MAN"... The first founder of this completely new rhythmic approach "2 + 4 = two and four = backbeat" played on a drum set in a song recording, and the first to describe the increased syncopation and more danceable style as "funky" in music was EARL PALMER: "Mr. Backbeat", who was born and raised in New Orleans.

The history of Groove Music that he built will be passed down to future generations forever... Blues the Butcher once again welcomes Yoko Utsumi as a guest, and takes on the challenge of expressing this importance and respect for his achievements through Naoyuki Uchida's extremely powerful recording and mix. Have we been able to take even one step into the hidden realm of the origins and sound of Groove Music?
--Numazawa Hisashi

■Track list