Samantha Fish
Paper Doll Live
**** out of *****
The Kansas City born, New Orleans based, blues/rock guitarist Samantha Fish makes her way by performing live hundreds of nights a year and has done so for decades. Now comes Paper Doll Live, her first official live album on Rounder Records, capturing the immensely talented Fish and her band's energetic show.
Touring on the back of her most recent record, and playing eight of the nine songs from Paper Doll, Fish (vocals and guitar) and company (bassist Ron Johnson, drummer Jamie Douglass, and keyboardist Mickey Finn) rev up and rock out at the Bijou Theatre in Knoxville, TN. While the vinyl release is a tidy nine tunes (with a completely different running order), the digital offering (reviewed here) expands things to double album length, letting Fish truly showcase her powerful voice, songwriting and fiery extended guitar playing.
In recent years Fish has toyed with moving more in a pop direction, but Paper Doll finds her returning to her blues-rock roots with powerful riffs and ripping solos. The album opens with a jolting cover of The MC5's "Kick Out The Jams!" announcing the band in grandiose fashion. An early highlight is "Can Ya Handle The Heat?" which uses slapping drums, while cooking with guitar gas. Another cover, " I Put A Spell On You", cools things down, giving Fish space to solo.
Special guests The McCreary Sisters join the band for a few tunes, adding their soulful backing vocals to the wicked slide guitar laced "I'm Done Runnin'", the bumping bass groove of "Lose You", the slow building "Don't Say It" and the organ led, tempo shifting, "Sweet Southern Sounds". Fish and company shift gears for a blazing mix of punk and blues on the breakneck "Miles To Go" which is a screaming highlight.
"Fortune Teller" starts chilled out, only for Fish to slam on the accelerator mid-song with fretboard runs that send up smoke signals. "Dream Girl" relaxes with shimmering guitar, organ, tambourine, and gorgeous falsetto vocals before building to a huge climax in rousing fashion.
Fish revs up the hill country blues stomp with a cover of "Poor Black Mattie" that is a head bopping late show highlight showcasing more dynamic guitar work while the digital release wraps up with the crisp hard rocker "Rusty Razor" and the extended blues riffage of "Black Wind Howlin'", putting on display all of Fish's immense talent with great guitar slinging and fantastic singing.
Captured in her natural habitat, Samantha Fish's Paper Doll Live is a crackling slice of guitar based blues-rock that is revved up and kicking.
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