There’s comfort to be found in the way things used to be done and there’s no doubt equal comfort to be found in the ownership of a proper beard. Perhaps these are the way to success for the modern bluesman as they have been working quite nicely for Ben Prestage and accordingly they have been continued on into his current album “Real Music”.
Seasoned is an entirely appropriate one word description for this album. It has all the hallmarks of many years practice with the make it look easy musicianship as Mr Prestage does his one man band thing over nearly the entire duration of the album. As we have come to expect, there is nothing that isn’t good natured - “Sloppy Drunk” and “Save The Roach” will bring many a smile to the partygoers amongst us - about the performance with only a hint of rebellion in the clever lyrics of “Real Music”.
Acoustic blues like this has its rules and this album follows those rules almost too slavishly. That’s not to say that “Real Music” is a bad album as it isn’t but I’m never sure that an artist does himself any favours by giving his fans exactly what they expect.