To Tom and all the Forum members:

We ought to get two things clear:

(1) The blues is a chord progression. Not to be confused with blue suede shoes, or your emotional state after someone stepped on them even after you asked, "Please don't."

(2) Blues guitar does not mean playing the blues on the guitar. The simplest blues is an art in itself (three 7th chords is alls you get) and here's where you find blues guitar. On the other hand, jazz blues substitutes entire sub-progressions for the three basic chords, offering easy escapes, lots of room for double-talk, etc.

Now that we've cleared that up, it's time for something that needs no clearing up: Tom Adams is a virtuoso of the blues guitar. Green Onions, as performed here, shows the kind of hybrid that can result when you turn a jazz musician loose on the three chords. But I can't even fake blues guitar, so in order to make it work we needed a solo voice strong enough to cut through the dense accompaniment and occasional smoke-and-mirrors. Tom has the voice, the vernacular and the venom. I agree with that this collaboration was a blast that deserves to be heard another time.

Aleck Rand