Samantha Fish

Samantha Fish was part of the Ruf Records ‘Girls With Guitars’ tour alongside Dani Wilde and Cassie Taylor and since then Dani Wilde has gone on to make some beautiful Blues & soul tinged music while Samantha has been seen primarily as a Blues guitarist – albeit a very good one.

‘Belle Of The West’ is definitely a game changer for Ms Fish and she adds a strong sense of roots, country and Americana to her undoubted skills. The result is rather wonderful.

The album was recorded at the Zebra Ranch, Luther & Cody Dickerson’s facility and produced by Luther. The album has a very personal feel to it, this is clearly a very personal statement from Samantha, but it has a very smooth presentation that really suits her voice and presentation.

She said of the album "To me, this is a natural progression. It's a storytelling record by a girl who grew up in the Midwest. It's very personal. I really focused on the song writing and vocals, the melodies and emotion, and on bringing another dimension to what I do. I wasn't interested in shredding on guitar, although we ended up with a few heavier tracks. I love Mississippi Blues; there's something very soulful and very real about that style of music, so this was a chance to immerse myself in that."

Her guitar is very fine but for me it is her voice that really puts the hair on the back of the neck standing to attention. She has all the pouting soulfulness you could wish for and no lack of sexiness in there but there is a more subtle feel to it as well and you can’t help but fall for the lady’s singing.

There are so many good numbers here: the opener ‘American Dream’ just resonates the North Mississippi hill country feel with Lillie Mae’s violin and Sharde Thomas’ fife really cutting through and making the song as joyous as the lyrics suggest or then there is the darker statement of ‘Blood In The Water’ with a haunting howl and beautiful violin in the break.
The title track is a beautiful lament for the charms of a faded hooker, soft and loaded with pathos, never leaving you pitying her but making you feel her pain.

Then there is R. L. Burnside’s classic ‘Ol’ Black Mattie’. I must have heard a hundred versions of it and this is one of the best featuring Fish duetting with Jimbo Mathus vocals and harmonica. If you only need one reason to get the album, this one is it.

The album is fantastic and seriously unexpected but looking back over Samantha Fish’ career to date I really shouldn’t be surprised. This is the lady who says "I'm never gonna be a traditional blues artist, because that's not who I am," she asserts. "But it's all the blues for me. When Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf came out, what they were doing didn't sound like anything that had been done in blues before. You've gotta keep that kind of fire and spirit. I'm never gonna do Muddy Waters better than Muddy Waters, so I have to be who I am and find my best voice.”
Job done.