{"id":134916,"date":"2023-03-28T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-03-28T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/?p=134916"},"modified":"2023-05-31T20:24:13","modified_gmt":"2023-06-01T03:24:13","slug":"rory-blocks-aint-nobody-worried-salutes-10-of-her-favorite-female-singers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/rory-blocks-aint-nobody-worried-salutes-10-of-her-favorite-female-singers\/","title":{"rendered":"Rory Block’s ‘Ain\u2019t Nobody Worried’ Salutes 10 of Her Favorite Female Singers"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

From the March\/April 2023<\/a> issue of Acoustic Guitar<\/em> | By<\/strong> Blair Jackson<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This third installment in Rory Block\u2019s Power Women of the Blues series takes the acoustic slide guitar master and blues belter in some unexpected but completely rewarding new directions. Over the course of around three dozen album releases since 1975, Block has primarily been in a deep country-blues bag. She is justifiably famous for her outstanding tribute albums to such well-known early country blues masters as Robert Johnson, Son House, Fred McDowell, Reverend Gary Davis, Skip James, and Booker \u201cBukka\u201d White, as well as many lesser-known figures from that world. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Rory-Block--Ain't-Nobody-Worried\"<\/a>

Rory Block<\/strong>
Ain\u2019t Nobody Worried<\/a><\/em><\/strong>
(Stony Plain Music)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The previous Power Women of the Blues releases include A Woman\u2019s Soul: A Tribute to Bessie Smith<\/em> (2018) and Prove It On Me<\/em> (2020), with interpretations of tunes by Memphis Minnie, Ma Rainey, and a host of more obscure women singers, like Lottie Kimbrough, Rosetta Howard, and Helen Humes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\u2019s still plenty of blues feeling on Ain\u2019t Nobody Worried <\/em>in Block\u2019s singing and playing, which ranges from wonderful slide work\u2014tasteful, never showy, and always somehow perfect for the song\u2014to fingerpicked and strummed acoustic. The guitars are her Martin Rory Block Signature OM-40s, as well as a Martin OM-28V. Block uses the Martin Gold Plus VTII acoustic pickup system and Martin medium-gauge MA150 Authentic strings. Her slide is a 15mm deep well socket, and she uses a Shubb capo. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A product of the lockdown era, the album finds Block handling everything we hear: the multiple guitar parts, the stacked lead and backing vocals, bass, and percussion\/drum programming, all expertly recorded and layered by Rob Davis at Kentucky Studios, in Sandy Hook, Kentucky.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The biggest surprise is the bold, genre-crossing song choices, heavy on iconic popular songs that are already very<\/em> closely associated with a pantheon of great women singers: \u201cI\u2019ll Take You There\u201d (Mavis Staples), \u201cMidnight Train to Georgia\u201d (Gladys Knight), \u201cI\u2019d Rather Go Blind\u201d (Etta James), \u201cDancing in the Street\u201d (Martha Reeves), \u201cLove Has No Pride\u201d (Bonnie Raitt, whom Block calls \u201cthe best singer on earth\u201d\u2014no argument here!), \u201cFast Car\u201d (Tracy Chapman), “Cried Like a Baby” (Koko Taylor), \u201cYou\u2019ve Got a Friend\u201d (Carole King), and more. A prolific songwriter through the years, Block also includes a version of her own \u201cLovin\u2019 Whiskey,\u201d which she describes in the liner notes as \u201cthe song that launched my career… that earned me a gold record and has remained my most popular and requested song for over three decades.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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