★★★★★
There is something of the colonial administrator's self congratulation at his understanding of native culture in these oddly configured reissues of American blues and zydeco originally recorded for the French Maison de Blues and Polydor labels in the late 1960s and early 1970s...
- www.offbeat.com
2010-11-09
★★★★★
Canned Heat were the most authentic of '60s white blues bands because they was formed by two genuine blues collectors: big friendly baritone Bob Hite, nicknamed the Bear, and weird, scrawny tenor Alan Wilson, nicknamed Blind Owl. Appropriating likely tunes from bluesman Floyd James and songster Henry Thomas, Wilson scored two unlikely 1968 hits ("On the Road Again" and "Goin' up the Country") before OD'ing in 1970, and Hite charted with Wilbert Harrison's R&B; strut "Let's Work Together...
- www.blender.com
2010-08-22
★★★★★
Invoking the legacy left by the Heat's deceased founder members Al Wilson and Bob Hite, this is the first album from the outfit reincarnated by survivors in 1999. Predictably enough, the album is a safety-first nostalgia exercise with help from past associates including Taj Mahal and the late John Lee Hooker. Stylistically it covers the blues waterfront, from Dallas Hodge's breezy "Bad Trouble" to the firecracker revival of "Let's Work Together"...
- www.uncut.co.uk
2010-06-19
★★★★★
The best Canned Heat lp solely because it contains four (of 11) cuts by Alan Wilson, who has one of the great freak voices and writes songs to match. As usual, it is dominated by Bob "Rastus" Hite, who must have been responsible for Rolling Stone's suggestion that the next Canned Heat album be called "Yassuh Boss." He is most offensive on one of those "introducing the band" jams ("Henry shoah does have the feelin', yeah") and on another exercise in solipsism called "Canned Heat...
- www.robertchristgau.com
2009-07-10
★★★★★
However much sense Alan Wilson's death meant in his life, which was never happy, it was inappropriate to his art, which until the end continued to thrive in that strange, mildly affectless, ruefully blissed-out dreamscape he discovered in country blues...
- www.robertchristgau.com
2009-07-10
★★★★★
I don't care how much you like the group, this collection of three-year-old tapes, rechanneled for stereo and running all of 23.12 minutes (that's right, it's really an E plus) insults your income and your intelligence. Are there really white blues scholars who want to know what the Bear sounded like when he was pure? Ridiculous, and sad.
- www.robertchristgau.com
2009-07-10
★★★★★
Canned Heat was the most authentic of the '60s white blues bands because it was formed by two genuine blues collectors: big friendly baritone Bob Hite, nicknamed Bear, and weird scrawny tenor Alan Wilson, nicknamed Blind Owl. Appropriating likely tunes from Chicago bluesman Floyd Jones and songster Henry Thomas, Wilson scored two unlikely 1968 hits before OD'ing in 1970, and lead vocalist Hite charted with Wilbert Harrison's r&b strut "Let's Work Together...
- www.robertchristgau.com
2009-07-10
★★★★★
The two-CD set, Uncanned! The Best of Canned Heat, crammed with outtakes, unreleased cuts, and curiosities(a 1968 Levi's ad), is a fairly comprehensive history of the'60s-'70s band that tried to make blues safe for white people.Unfortunately, Heat's best moments ? hits like "Going Up the Country"and "On the Road Again," choice blues covers, and collaborations withJohn Lee Hooker and Little Richard ? are merely islands scatteredacross a sea of aimless boogie.
- ew.com
2009-06-12
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