Available at their website and at CD Baby.

The Dog House Blues Band, Self-Titled

As a native Long Islander, I love to see when a great original band develops out of the Island's tired classic-rock cover band scene. I use the term "original" for the Dog House Blues Band not because they do their own songs, but because of their creative approach to putting together their sets. Fueling their excellent musicianship and good-time energy is a knack for finding wonderful obscure blues songs which they arrange tightly and inventively and make their own. These, combined with a smattering of more familiar blues and blues-rock covers, make Dog House more deserving of the term "original" than many bands that write their own material.

Their new, cleanly produced studio album (not yet available online) shows the band having just as much fun with Willie Dixon's "When the Lights Go Out" as with the Beatles' "Oh Darling." If you're in the area and looking to have a great time with a live band, it would be hard to do much better.

Joe Vicino & the Smokedaddys, Shine

The latest, relatively mellow CD from Joe Vicino & The Smokedaddys follows the Eric Clapton tradition, with a lot of lyrical writing and a smaller amount of rockin' blues. Guitarist and singer Vicino, who writes the material, shows his sensitive side in songs like the title track, as well as in instrumentals like "Josephine" and "Before You Close Your Eyes," dolling them up with the silvery, almost pastoral, yet intricate guitar solos at which he excels. His trio rolls out rocking Chicago and Southern electric blues like "You Got It Going On" and "Texas Bound," while just as comfortably slowing down for numbers rooted in country blues like the Robert Johnson-inspired "Squeezetoy" (with guest Kerry Kearney on slide guitar) and the swampy "Delta Town." "Black Cloud Blues" has a Stevie Ray Vaughn smoothness, while "Scofflaw Blues" shows off Vicino's slide mastery.