Pee-Wee Get My Gun

Personnel: T Model Ford (vocals, guitar); Frank Frost (keyboards); Spam, Sam Carr (drums).
Engineers: Estella Smith, Bruce Watson.
Recorded at the Money Shot, Oxford, Mississippi; Lunati Farms, Holly Springs & T Model's home in Greenville, Mississippi. Includes liner notes by Matthew Johnson.
With band members named T Model Ford (guitar, vocals, songs) and Spam (drums), the casual observer might mistake PEE WEE GET MY GUN for a Jon Spencer Blues Explosion-style re-appropriation of the blues. But this debut album is straight-up and stripped-down blues, Ford's guitar and Spam's drums joined only by occasional and unobtrusive piano and organ by Frank Frost.
Ford's voice is a deceptively simple instrument, equally capable of the controlled emotion of Delta blues pioneers like Son House or even Robert Johnson, and, when necessary, the squalling yowls of R.L. Burnside or even Captain Beefheart, as on the powerful "I'm Insane." The songs are mostly originals, based on traditional Delta instrumental forms. And lyrically, though the songs are couched in more modern terms, they still explore the same kinds of cultural details that make the older Delta blues chestnuts resonate. PEE WEE GET MY GUN is a strong and intriguing debut.