Slickly produced and soulfully performed, Give It Up is the blues and blues rock as dressed up as it really ever should be. Raitt handles herself with grace, but doesn’t deny the genre its signature down-home grit and spittle. And with Raitt on the reins of the guitar, she’s got her finger on the musical pulse of this record. Not that she’s the only one pulling her weight or anything. Under the Falling Sky (a nice Jackson Browne cover) wouldn’t have near the heft it does without that drum and harmonica powering it like a steam train, and the electric backing Raitt on Love Me Like a Man provide as much power as anything else. The sax on Nothing Seems to Matter also brings a nice smokey nighttime feel. But the heart of this record is Raitt’s amazing voice and her amazing guitar work, like on the opener, Give It Up Or Let Me Go. Too Long At the Fair also highlights Raitt as a songwriter, with her pious lyrics painting a very vivid picture that her guitar can’t alone. And while I won’t pretend that Raitt doesn’t occasionally slip into the same Boz Scaggs trap of sounding perhaps a bit too familiar for their own good, there’s more style to Raitt’s personal brand of the blues. A track like You Got to Know How is a blues track distinguished by its unique style in bringing in a clarinet and a very Old West-type piano to accompany Raitt and co. I won’t lie, I don’t really foresee myself really returning to this record that frequently, if at all, but for what it’s worth, it’s definitely a good one.
Rating: 3.5/5
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