2025 – Joplin Street Music
Release Date : September
22, 2025
By Phillip
Smith; December
13, 2025
Original source : phillycheezeblues.blogspot.com
It sure didn’t take very long
for the hard-driving Texas-style blues-rock of Jay Hooks to fully grab
my attention with his latest album Tequila & Bullets. His ferocity
and passion as a guitarist shine on each and every song. With Hooks on
guitar and vocals, he is joined by Jorge Castillo on rhythm guitar, Brock
Proctor on bass guitar, Matthew R Johnson on drums, Barry Seelen
on Hammond B-3, and Myron ‘Big Jack’ Jackson on trumpet.
Hooks glides the album in on full throttle with “Evenrude Boat Motor” his adrenalin-fueled intro set in a speedboat. I dig the exhilarating ride this blistering hard-rocking song delivers in just two minutes and six seconds. With a name like “Tequila & Bullets”, the title-track has got to be great, and it truly is. A heavy blues-soaked rhythm keeps this outlaw blues track churning while Hooks absolutely amazes me with a fiery guitar performance. “A Woman Like You”, a tantalizing southern rocker rooted in stripper culture is a genuine favorite with its bump-and-grind groove. In a eyes wide open fashion, Hooks pulls the listener in to a kick-ass track “Mississippi Sheiks” and invites them aboard a time-machine to see the legendary band whose recording career lasted from 1930-1935. With name-drops of blues heroes Bo Carter (1893-1964) and Peg Leg Howell (1888-1966), the track boasts a phenomenal guitar solo from Hooks served atop a thunderous beat provided by Johnson. The album closes with a slow-cooker called “Mexican Larry”. Beautifully played and dripping with emotion, this ballad where unending nightmares spawned from bad decisions sit on one’s soul with a dire heaviness. Leaving the listener to come to their own conclusions regarding exactly what happened, tasks the imagination and leads to multiple listens.
I love the way Hooks masterfully weaves his songs together into this Quentin Tarantino-esque album-oriented listen. Tequila & Bullets is a record which begs to be heard in its entirely. I highly recommend it.
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| Photo by Cathy Wotipka |
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| Photo by Cathy Wotipka |
For more information about Jay
Hooks, visit his website https://jayhooksbandbandzoogle.com/