Deuces Wild is a blues album by BB King from 1997. Funny thing is that I jokingly wrote that an album was the gazillionth in a review. I think it was the fifteenth or something like that. It’s child’s play compared to BB King. Deuces Wild is his 35th(!) studio album! That’s respect! But of course, he’s the King after all. Of course there are other people up there as well, also legends, Albert King, Freddie King and perhaps my personal favorite Johnny Winter. Oh, and Muddy Waters… The list could go on forever.
But I think that there’s no denying that BB King might be the most well-known household name of them all. If you know one of them, it ought to be BB King.
I’m not an expert on his music. It was the first blues artist I discovered though. I don’t know, maybe it was in the mid-eighties – early nineties. I got a few albums on vinyl and I absolutely loved them. I don’t think they were particularly representative though. In my mind, some 35 years later I think that Deuces Wild is more of a true representation of his music. It’s not a lot of guitar. That is to say that BB King might not have been a virtuoso, but every note that he played mattered. It’s not anything like the speed of Gary Moore. Just sparse licks with a heavenly vibrato.
There’s a lot of soul in his music. It’s very soothing for the soul. And even if there’s no speed involved in the guitar playing the volume is cranked up. There’s rather one, two or three note phrases than exploring the entire guitar neck. As I said, Every note counts and is as important as the other. But that’s not to say that the guitar is the only instrument in the songs. It’s a full orchestra as usual. It’s an amazing display of excellent musicianship.
Deuces Wild features another famous person on each song. So BB King shares the vocals, and instrumentation with other giants like Eric Clapton, Bonnie Raitt, Dr John, Joe Cocker, Dionne Warwick and many many more. I like this approach. It’s like if you take the creme de la creme of the blues, put them together and then shows everyone who’s the King! Of course, it doesn’t come across that way. It seem very humble. But it’s BB Kings album after all and at least this critic is somewhat biased in his favor.
