Rory Block: Last Fair Deal

By GRAHAM REID

(Herald rating: * * * *)

Acoustic country-blues guitarist Block delivers yet another accomplished album, this marked by her humour, dirty edged playing, homage to her mentors Son House and Robert Johnson (the earthy Travellin' Riverside Blues gets a persuasive evocation), some multi-tracked vocals where she becomes a gospel chorus, and an extraordinary, if too brief, exploration of Amazing Grace, which leaves the original tune well behind.

Block might be a white gal who grew up in New York but her soul is somewhere in the South and a meeting with Son House in '65 when she was in her early teens confirmed the righteousness of the path she was embarking on. Almost four decades later she is a veteran musician - but still looks 20 years younger than she is - and her music just gets deeper, wider (try Declare, inspired by the Book of Job) and more inspirational. Her Cry Out Loud opens with, "there's an old nurse spends her life caring for dying children" and becomes a moving, not remotely maudlin, moral lesson about love, tears and compassion.

Part Leo Kottke, part Joni Mitchell, but mostly a Delta bluesman in the guise of a blonde born in New Jersey.


Label: Elite