It looks like B.B. King and producer T Bone Burnett have done everyone willing to listen One Kind Favor with their latest release, a new collection covering blues classics from B.B.’s musical heroes. Much like Rick Rubin with Johnny Cash and Jack White with Loretta Lynn, Burnett extracts quintessential B.B. throughout the proceedings and creates a highlight of the year.
They grab you by the heart right from the get-go. It’s hard to keep a lump out of your throat and a tear out of your eye as 83-year-old B.B. requests we “See That My Grave Is Kept Clean” on this Blind Lemon Jefferson tune. His solo is so sweet and melodious that it’s hard not to be selfish and hope it will be a long while before “his heart stops beating/and his hands are cold.”
Another T-Bone, Walker, is honored as they cover his “I Get So Weary.” B.B., Chuck Berry, and Jimi Hendrix all give Walker credit as being a major influence on them. A horn section joins the arrangement and B.B.’s voice gets raspy as he sings out in frustration “when my baby's not around.” Next, another Walker is remembered with Lee Vida Walker’s “Get These Blues Off Me.” B.B. presents the flipside to the story as the narrator is the one who has “gone away” because he “can't put up with you.” The tempo is slowed way down, and Lucille becomes even more beguiling. If you allow yourself to get lost in the song, you may notice the lights dim, the smell of cigarettes, and the clattering of ice in a just-finished drink. You’ll want to grab the first woman you see and slow dance your troubles away.
The pace is picked up for Howlin’ Wolf’s “How Many More Years.” The narrator is heading out the door with the music revealing a spring in his step. He’d “soon rather be dead, sleeping six feet in the ground” than to continue being treated so bad. On Oscar Lollie’s “Waiting For Your Call” Lucille sounds plaintive again as we hear another story reversal as this narrator is paralyzed by love, sitting by the phone hoping for a return that likely won’t happen. He doesn’t even care “how many times you have left me/ and you said you never really cared.”
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