Following up on their critically acclaimed, Holler and Stomp, which was nominated for several Blues Music Awards, The Cash Box Kings recently released Black Toppin’, another album that captures a classic yet contemporary blues sound.
The original compositions of vocalists Oscar Wilson and Joe Nosek, who also plays harmonica on all of the songs, traverse various dimensions of the blues genre, such as jump blues with “Oscar’s Jump,” modern Chicago blues with “Blues Falling Down on Me,” the mid-20th century sound of “Hot Biscuit Baby” and what the band calls “bluesabilly” in “I Don’t Wanna Fight.”
On the several covers, the band provides updated and up-tempo versions of early Delta blues, such as Robert Johnson’s, “Walkin’ Blues,” 1950’s Chicago blues with Jimmy Rogers, “Money, Marbles, and Chalk” and even a bluesy rendition of The Velvet Underground’s “Run, Run, Run.”
World-renowned blues musicians, Billy Flynn, Barrelhouse Chuck, and Kenny “Beedy Eyes” Smith perform on much of the album, which will, in all likelihood, receive new accolades and award nominations.
