You might be unfamiliar with Chris Cotton, but that could be about to change pretty soon. Cotton, the former frontman for the California-based Blue Eyed Devils, wandered down to Clarksdale, Mississippi and with help from producer Jimbo Mathus, has assembled one of the most amazing blues releases of the year. Combining the Delta, Piedmont, Jug Band, and String blues along with old-timey country as well as folk music into one album is no small feat, but Cotton has brilliantly managed to do so with I Watched The Devil Die (Yellow Dog Records). Cotton is as fine a guitarist as you’ll run across and his gravelly, expressive vocals are a perfect match for the material, which includes impressive covers of songs by Blind Willie McTell (“Dying Crapshooter’s Blues), the Mississippi Sheiks (if Cotton‘s rousing cover of “That‘s It“ doesn‘t get your toe tapping, there must be a tag tied around it), Skip James (“I’m So Glad”), and Mississippi John Hurt (“Louis Collins”), each of which are given a brand new shine by Cotton. There are also seven original tracks written by Cotton, which blend smoothly with the older songs on the disc, most notably the title track and the album’s centerpiece, the nine-minute-plus romp “Black Night,” a menacing track which could have gone on an additional nine minutes with no problem and features some outstanding slide guitar from Clarksdale native Big Jack Johnson, and Cotton’s tribute to “the greatest bluesman that ever lived,” Big Bill Broonzy (“Blues For Big Bill”). Mathus, who produced Buddy Guy’s last two albums, gives this disc a live, loose, and ragged feel, just like a jam session from 50 years ago. The musicians featured on I Watched The Devil Die also warrant mentioning. In addition to Johnson, other featured musicians include Mathus himself, who plays banjo, drums, bass, and slide guitar on selected tracks, and another Clarksdale native, drummer Lee Williams, whose propulsive boogie beat really keeps things moving along, Barry Bays (bass), Hamilton Rott (fiddle), Adam Woodard (with some great barrelhouse piano), Olga (washboard, percussion, and fiddle), and the Clarksdale Hummingbirds (backing vocals) all make solid contributions to the album’s sound. I Watched The Devil Die is definitely one disc you’ll be playing over and over again.