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8/6/2006
Jim Carnes
Fiona Boyes may have been born and reared in Australia, but her heart is in America's Mississippi Delta. She plays guitar and growls country blues like few others, no matter where they come from. Boyes began her musical education via the late blues artists Robert Johnson and Memphis Minnie. She's the first woman to win the acoustic division of the Blues Foundation's International Blues Challenge for emerging blues talent (in 2003) and even had the great Pinetop Perkins pronounce her "the best gal guitar player I heard in more than 35 years." Perkins said, "I ain't never heard a woman finger-pick a guitar like that since Memphis Minnie." On "Lucky 13," Boyes finger-picks and slides and swings through 13 tunes (10 of which she wrote) that cover the gamut of American blues, from Delta to Chicago style, acoustic to electric. She is backed by a full band and special guests "Steady Rollin' " Bob Margolin (Muddy Waters band), Marcia Ball and Mark "Kaz" Kazanoff & the Texas Horns. Among the best cuts: "Chicken Wants Corn," "Stranger in Your Eyes," "Pigmeat Lover" and "High Cotton" -- all of which she wrote.