DANNY KROHA - Angels Watching Over Me LP

Nicely priced. One copy only.

Third Man has put out records by a diverse array of artists since it opened up shop in Nashville in 2009, from Wanda Jackson to Insane Clown Posse (ever seen those two mentioned in the same sentence before?)

But its focus on vinyl and analog tape are defiantly old fashioned. And now they’ve put out their most old fashioned record to date: Danny Kroha’s Angels Watching Over Me.

Kroha broke into the music business in the late ‘80s as one third of the Gories, Detroit’s most incendiary garage band since the MC5, kicking out the kind of grimy, blues-influenced jams that White could have only dreamed of emulating with the White Stripes.

Since the Gories broke up in 1992, Kroha has played in a host of other Detroit bands, but this collection of blues covers (plus one stylistically appropriate original) is his first solo album. And when we say, “blues covers,” we're not talking about Cream’s version of Robert Johnson’s “Crossroads.”

Angels is pure gutbucket blues. Recorded in mono on a primitive four-track cassette recorder, Kroha performs solo versions of songs popularized by the likes of Leadbelly and Blind Lemon Jefferson, accompanying himself on acoustic guitar, banjo, and other old-timey instruments like the washtub bass and diddley bow. Talk about a time warp.