Steve Baker & The LiveWires The Great Divide (CD)

(Timezone) 12 tracks - digisleeve

After a decade-long professional career as a highly respected sideman, harmonica icon Steve Baker released his first solo album as a singer, songwriter and frontman in 2018.

"Perfect Getaway" received excellent reviews and showed the mid-sixties from a completely new side. Since then he has played over 50 concerts with his band The LiveWires and has developed an instantly recognizable sound over the past two years, which now regularly generates enthusiasm among live audiences.

The heart of the band is the interplay between Jan Mohr's exciting guitar sounds, the rock-solid bass of Briton Jeff Walker, and the elastic grooves of young drummer Henri Jerratsch, who joined the band in early 2019. Together they form the foundation for Baker's expressive vocals and tearing harp arrangements. In addition, there are beautiful backing vocals by Steve's daughter Gina. The wiry, sparingly arranged sound with gripping choral singing offers the perfect medium to show off Baker's idiosyncratic songs to their best advantage.

In July 2019, Steve and the band spent a week in the Hamburg chief rock studio of Maffay producer Peter Keller to record new material together with sound engineer Tillmann Ilse.