Hank Ballard's piano pumping Wendy DeWitt teams up with Norton Buffalo's drummer, Kirk Harwood on a Getaway (Wette Music) wherein she sings eight blues-drenched originals, covers Chuck Willis' 1953 "Feel So Bad (Feel Like A Ball Game On A Rainy Day)" and Big Joe Turner's 1973 arrangement of Willie Dixon's 1956 "29 Ways." It's a balls-to-the-wall affair yet when you add trumpet, trombone, sax and Sunnyland Slim's guitarist, Steve Freund (who chips in with CD highlight "Folks Like You"), then the party really gets started.
Pianist DeWitt can not only howl at the moon but she has a left-hand that rivals Jerry Lee Lewis. She's a boogie-woogie monster whose sense of irony, humor and down-home fem-centric defiance informs her songs like a slap in the face. She's not above telling you how to "Treat A Woman," that she's "Built To Last," that your lovin' will "Never Be Too Much" and that she's "Trouble," all before the oh-so-profound closer "Everybody's Crying for Something." Here's a singer-songwriter drowning in the throes of relationship hell with intermittent moments of heaven (if you know what I mean).
These two are two-time regional winners and International Blues Challenge finalists. They feel it and make you feel it. And the blues ain't the blues unless you can feel it. These 11 tracks in just under 51 minutes are pushed hard by Harwood and the bass of Steve Evans, the two thick as thieves and right as rain. The horns add a celebratory tinge even when Wendy's moanin' and a'groanin' down in the depths of the blues.
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