There are no extended solos, funky revamps or changes of tempo. His band play the songs as well as anyone can. (Green’s sound, via Wilko, extended into the post-punk guitar of Gang Of Four and beyond, and his influence was arguably much more important and exciting than that of Clapton, Page or any of the other blues boomers.) You won’t hear new tricks too often here, Wilko does what he’s been doing all his career, playing extraordinary rhythm and lead in the way that really only he can do. Their later guitarist, Mick Green, was both a collaborator with and an influence on Wilko Johnson. That band’s earliest days, with Johnny Kidd, gave The Who Shakin’ All Over. The girder linking the two men is, of course, the greatest British rock’n’roll band of all time, The Pirates. And, finally, amazing because it’s a great record. Feelgood suggests he was never the meek kind of guitarist) and songwriting. Amazing because there aren’t many people who’d gel with Wilko’s history, personality (his time with the Dr. Amazing because Wilko should have had a singer as good as this years ago to complement his brilliant band. In a year that most of us would have spent… I don’t know, quietly at home, Wilko has toured, given interviews, taken drugs, toured, toured and now recorded an amazing album. Because, surely, if there’s anyone who wants to live the way he likes, it’s Wilko, a man whose reaction to the news of his (fortunately still delayed) imminent demise was to live his life utterly in the present. Now, being the second great singer to vocalise Wilko Johnson’s lyrics (you know who the first one is), he brings years of experience and sympathy to his role. Having spent years translating the neurotic rage and brandified existential doubt of Pete Townshend, Daltrey is expert in finding the emotion and power in someone else’s words.
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