Artist:     Toronzo Cannon and the Chicago Wa

Album:     The Preacher, The Politician or The Pimp

Label:     Alligator

Release Date:     9.20.2019

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When Toronzo Cannon was on Delmark, prior to his arrival at Alligator, he caught attention as a fiery guitarist, Hendrix accolade, forceful vocalist with a sharp contemporary outlook. His reputation through his Alligator debut, The Chicago Way, and now with this follow-up, cement him as one of today’s best blues songwriters and blues entertainers. Cannon has plenty of source material, drawing observations and stories form his “day job’ as a bus driver for Chicago’s CTA. He also draws from the lessons passed down from his grandparents who raised him. Cannon plays like a blues-rocker but writes like the best of singer-songwriters. He is both humble and confident as attested to by this statement, “It’s not about the solos. It’s about the songs. People get used to everyday life, so it’s easy to miss the things around them. I write about those things. I know the problems of Chicago, the hardship, ’cause we’re always a scapegoat. But I choose to love and respect the city because of the Chicago giants that came here from down south. I’m proud to be standing on the shoulders of every great Chicago blues musician who came before me.”

Cannon is a hard worker, determined to be successful and now looked to as the ambassador of Chicago blues. That’s how far he’s climbed which is remarkable considering he didn’t even start playing guitar until he was 22. Cannon keeps rising but his 2016 The Chicago Way set a high bar. Living Blues magazine’s readers voted it number one in their annual poll. The album and Cannon were nominated for four BMAs. He’s toured internationally at a fervid pace since its debut, thrown out the first pitch at a Chicago Cubs game and been a feature of a PBS segment.

Now he’s back with these 12 originals, a mix of biting social commentary and humorous observations. There’s the male boasting in “Stop Me When I’m Lying,” and the tongue-in-cheek humor of “Insurance,” a subject that has some comical spots in TV commercials too. He brings the social commentary in the title track, in the Martin Luther King-inspired “The Silence of My Friends,” “The First 24,”and in the moving closing track, perhaps aimed at police brutality, “I’m Not Scared.” Others like “She loved me (Again)” and “Get Together Or Get Apart” are in the more standard blues lexicon and become vehicles for explosive guitar work.

Cannon’s band, dubbed The Chicago Way, include some the city’s best blues musicians:keyboardist Roosevelt Purifoy, bassist Marvin Little, and drummer Melvin “Pooky Styx” Carlisle. High profile guests join such as Nora Jean, adding vocals to “That’s What I Love About ‘Cha’,” Billy Branch with harp on “Insurance,” and Joanna Connor with slide guitar on “I’m Not Scared,” a tune which also features three background vocalists. A three-piece horn section appears on “Stop Me When I’m Lying.”

Toronzo Cannon has already established himself as one of the most important voices in blues. He’s got the songs, the flair of an entertainer, the guitar chops and a distinctive voice. Most importantly though, he knows how to tell stories with a balance between the serious and humorous, and a knack for making his keen observations relatable.

ꟷJim Hynes