{"id":25877,"date":"2023-08-26T05:30:53","date_gmt":"2023-08-26T09:30:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=25877"},"modified":"2023-08-23T11:21:08","modified_gmt":"2023-08-23T15:21:08","slug":"album-review-coco-montoya-writing-on-the-wall","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2023\/08\/26\/album-review-coco-montoya-writing-on-the-wall\/","title":{"rendered":"Album Review: Coco Montoya \u2013 Writing on the Wall"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-25878\" src=\"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/08\/coco_montoya_writing.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"350\" height=\"350\" srcset=\"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/08\/coco_montoya_writing.jpg 350w, http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/08\/coco_montoya_writing-300x300.jpg 300w, http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/08\/coco_montoya_writing-150x150.jpg 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 350px) 100vw, 350px\" \/>Guitarist Coco Montoya first came to my attention way back in 1997 when he was featured on <i>Behind the Iron Curtain<\/i>, the then-new album from John Mayall\u2019s reactivated Bluesbreakers. I eventually learned that even then, Montoya was no newcomer; he had been taken under the wing of no less a legend than Albert Collins. He would remain with the Bluesbreakers for a decade, making his tenure as Mayall\u2019s lead guitarist one of the longest in the band\u2019s long history.<\/p>\n<p>But of course Montoya had his own music to do, and by 1995 he had released his solo debut, <i>Gotta Mind to Travel<\/i>. Now in 2023 he returns with <i>Writing on the Wall<\/i>, his 11<sup>th<\/sup>\u00a0 solo studio set, and his sixth for prestigious Alligator Records.<\/p>\n<p>Montoya\u2019s style is straightforward and highly melodic. He can tear the roof off the sucker lead guitarwise, but his songs are more than vehicles for six-string fireworks: they\u2019re actual songs. Writing mostly with sometime rhythm guitarist Dave Steen, Montoya serves up 13 tracks for varied electric blues. Don Robey\u2019s loping \u201cYou Got Me (Where You Want Me)\u201d is typical of the uptempo character of the songs. It\u2019s one of only a few covers on <i>Writing on the Wall<\/i> (the other is a reading of Lonnie Mack\u2019s \u201cStop.\u201d)<\/p>\n<p>Another choice of cover shows Montoya\u2019s exceptional taste. Andy Fraser was bassist of Free, and co-composer of their smash hit \u201cAll Right Now.\u201d Fraser\u2019s 1975 solo album <i>&#8230;In Yyour Eyes<\/i> didn\u2019t set the charts on fire; you\u2019ve likely never heard it. It wasn\u2019t even released in the U.S. But Montoya covers \u201cBe Good to Yourself\u201d from that LP, and he makes the tune his own.<\/p>\n<p>Multi-instrumentalist Jeff Paris duels on lead on the title track, and some other Montoya pals stop by to add their own brands of sizzle. Paris\u2019 composition \u201c(I\u2019d Rather Feel) Bad About Doin\u2019 It\u201d is a rewrite of \u201cFever,\u201d but it\u2019s fun nonetheless. Guests and sidemen notwithstanding, Coco Montoya is the star of this show, and his commanding guitar and vocals reign over the set.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Guitarist Coco Montoya first came to my attention way back in 1997 when he was featured on Behind the Iron Curtain, the then-new album from John Mayall\u2019s reactivated Bluesbreakers. I [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":25878,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,49,65],"tags":[4055],"class_list":["post-25877","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blues","category-new-release","category-review","tag-coco-montoya","cat-9-id","cat-49-id","cat-65-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25877","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25877"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25877\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25881,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25877\/revisions\/25881"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25878"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25877"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25877"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25877"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}