© Bluestronomical Publishing Inc. 2007

Bobby Parker, Clarence ‘Gatemouth’ Brown and Buddy Guy
Carlos Santana Presents Blues At Montreux 2004
Eagle Eye EE 39127-9

Eagle Vision's Live at Montreux DVD series focuses on all music genres. Like others in the series, Blues At Montreux contains high quality production, professional editing, excellent sound, impressive camera work and clever authoring. There are plenty of camera angles (side stage, on stage, front stage, etc.) and none of them are obstructed. All three concerts - each is on a separate disc - were filmed in wide screen high definition on July 12, 2004, in the Stravinski Auditorium at the esteemed festival.

Bobby Parker is likely the least known among the threesome. He is one of those artists you watch and think wow, where has he been? Parker is a DC-based bluesman who, in the 1950s, played rock 'n' roll guitar behind Bo Diddley, Sam Cooke, Jackie Wilson and The Everly Brothers.
The proceedings begin with an instrumental that showcases Parker's invigorating band of five members including Dane Paul Russel, who looks like Peter Green and plays harp like it is a guitar. On "It's Unfair" he delivers blazing and ripping lip-singed blown harp. "Break It Up" is Chicago blues/funk led by Parker"s contemporary blues guitar. He roams the stage on "Breaking Up Somebody's Home" yet fails to display any stage presence. Parker's vocals, which include James Brown-like screams, aren't powerful nor do they contain a lot of range. Parker becomes a bit monotonous, and sometimes his surging guitar sounds too similar to Buddy Guy and Roy Buchanan.

Dressed in his typical black and white cowboy shirt, 80-year-old Clarence 'Gatemouth' Brown proves to be a classy and well-rounded musician. With his fingers, he effortlessly plays versatile guitar. This concert of 10 upbeat tunes also begins with an instrumental which reveals Brown's talented and jazzy sounding four-piece band. There are no lines drawn between jazz and blues by this impartial group. If you don't enjoy sax, keyboard and guitar solos in every song, you may become bored with this concert. The enormously sized Eric Demmer toots his alto sax into the upper stratosphere. He blows it as gentle as a summer breeze to as fierce as a thunderstorms wind. Brown plays fiddle on the stomping "Sunrise Cajun Style". Overall, his instrumentation is livelier than his vocals. "I've Got My Mojo Working" is unlike all the overplayed versions of the classic song. Many musical styles are heard in Gate's music. The American music icon passed away in September 2005 after Hurricane Katrina destroyed his New Orleans home.

This concert doesn't seem to have a flow to it and it does not contain enough Buddy Guy electric guitar. Strangely, Guy opens unaccompanied with three acoustic numbers when he has never been much of a rhythm guitarist. Still, Guy maintains his killer smile which could light up the darkest night. His vocals are as dramatic and dynamic as ever. He has an innate ability to deliver lyrics like he is telling a story to a friend. His decimating lead guitar solos range from sluggish to lightening fast where his pick-held hand oscillates faster than his fret-placed hand. Ever the showman, Guy banters with the crowd between songs and pulls wild facial grimaces. As you could have guessed, he walks through the crowd while playing an extended guitar solo, but instead of the cameras following him, they continue to film the onstage band members.

This 238-minute, three DVD blues set gets attributed to Carlos Santana, but like the cover photo, his role is primarily in the background. When he does join these celebrated artists on 11 of 31 songs, they launch into ultra-jam mode and it's exceptional if you enjoy watching/hearing multiple guitars getting a groove on.

- Tim Holek -


Southwest Blues DVD Review - July 2007

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