If you’re expecting another rootsy upbeat rocker from the BoDeans, the frankly scarifying blues of “Slave” likely comes as something of a shock.

The Blues Brothers fought their label to make sure early heroes like Floyd Dixon, Steve Cropper and Isaac Hayes received royalties.

There’s a blessedly long list of food-based blues. Add Dallas-based Smokin’ Joe Kubek and Bnois King’s “Cornbread” to that lip-smacking list.

Here is a review of ‘In The Mix,’ the first album in almost five years by the multi-talented contemporary bluesman Bernard Allison.

There was no small amount of violence in Blind Willie Johnson’s original take, and that’s boldly recaptured in this unheard version by the Staple Singers.

Robben Ford’s new song is loose, truly collaborative — the opposite of those emailed digital confections so often dubbed “duets” these days.

Robben Ford brings his usual canny sense of craft to this collaboration with Warren Haynes, even as he — once again — more than holds his own.

Remembering lesser-known sides from Muddy Waters harpist Little Walter, who hurtled his instrument forward before dying today in 1968.

You can’t dig too deeply into blues, as Steve Earle is doing these days, without a teeth-splintering clang of your shovel against Robert Johnson’s legend.

This lead song from ‘Muddy Wolf at Red Rocks’ makes clear the difficulty Joe Bonamassa — really, anybody — has in taking on Muddy Waters.