Doug Prescott Band

Doug Prescott is an artist from a bygone era who has his roots ingrained firmly within the blues rock scene he grew up listening to and imitating, and even in 2013 he refuses to dilute his Americana ethics with possibly more mainstream contemporary music varieties. This could be a good or bad thing depending what your view is on 60/70s type soul; the very kind that was once played in in ramshackle ‘watering holes’ and convertible Cadillac’s back in that time. Personally, I can’t get enough of it and here’s hoping the genre experiences a big, but highly improbable, resurgence.

Naturally within Blues in the Key of Sea, the guitars play a leading role within each composition, accompanied by tricky trickling of a jiving piano, but don’t expect downbeat depressed songs; no, these are bluegrass tracks composed to uplift and inspire with their brightness and richness of tone and up-tempo conveyance.

Prescott himself has a completely adequate voice; he’s no muddy waters but it’s clear to note that he isn’t making a concerted attempt to be anything but himself. This is also pertinent within each of the songs which transmute between several nuances that enrich the album’s freshness and make it attractive to a modern audience. Amongst the confident rhythms, the band threw in country and even reggae to make this collection of expressive records as eclectic as the cosmopolitan assemblage of members who contributed on it.