Richie Pavledis - "Live At The Charles"

I found this album browsing around on cdbaby.com about 3 years ago. Richie is a solo musician from Australia, and like the album title says, this was recorded live at the Charles Hotel in Perth. The music is blues, with Richie playing guitar and harmonica, as well as thumping on a bass drum. He's not only a talented player, but a talented songwriter, having written several of the songs himself. The songs are delta blues and his finger picking does them justice. He's got a great voice for blues as well. One of the neat things about this album, is that because it was recorded live in a small venue there's a feeling of almost being there. During a low point in the music, you can sometimes hear muted conversation and even the click of billiard balls. This is one of my favorite albums, and it gets listened to on a regular basis. Track seven, "Take this Hammer" was the inspiration for a song I wrote a few years ago. It's a goal of mine to able to play like this guy, as his finger picking is a smooth mix of bass runs and hammer ons/pulls offs to flesh out chord changes that makes it sound like there is more than one guitar going. You can here clips from the album on his website by clicking on sounds.