Favourites - North Mississippi Allstars - Shake Hands wwith Shorty

I keep a list of favourite CDs I would like to have on vinyl.  These are genrerally ones that were released in the 90's and early 00s that have never beeen on vinyl.  I made the lisr some years ago now and there were about 70  on it originally.  Wuth the vinyl revival some have now seen the light of day and there are now ONLY 50 to go.  I am resigned that some by some pretty obsure artists or artists that have now left us may never see the light of day. 

So I was really pleased when Shake Hands with Shorty was released on vinyl for the first time on Record Store Day last year.  I first heard the CD when I was browsing in Radar Records in Christchurch around 2000 and it was playing in store.  

The band is built around brothers Luther and Cody Dickinson who are the sons of Jim Dickinson, the almost legendary member of the Dixie Flyers who backed many soul artists in the 60s, played piano on Wild Horses and produced The Replacements.  

Shake Hands with Shorty is their debut albium and is steeped in the hill country blues style of Mississippi Fred McDowell,  Junior Kimbrough and RL Burnside.  It starts with the MCDowell classic Shake 'em on Down, includes Burnside's Going Down South and ends with Kimbrough's All Night Long. 

I already had McDowell's I Do Not Play No Rock'n'Roll and knew him through songs like Good Morning Little School Girl and You Gotta Move (check the Stones' version on Sticky Fingers) but this was my introduction to the other two.  This is a different style of blues, driving repetitive and a link to some more modern sounds.  

I have continued to track the Dickinson boys both with the North Mississippi Allstars (their Up and Rolling album was my favourite of 2019) and as session musicians where they have supported favouries like John Hiatt and Anders Osborne.