Pete Feenstra chatted to Snowy White in July 2022 for Get Ready to ROCK! Radio. First broadcast 10 July 2022.

Soulfood [Release date 11.07.22]

Snowy White has always been a one guitar blues man. The fact his Les Paul Goldtop have graced some of the biggest band over the last 4 decades – Peter Green, Pink Floyd, Thin Lizzy and Roger Waters – has often obscured the fact he’s essentially a fine blues player with a rich tone and emotive phrasing

Looking back at his career you imagine he learnt his craft early on with Peter Green, because all these years later he still sounds like a cross between his old mentor and Carlos Santana.

That said, Snowy has also had his own instantly recognisable sound, while his spoken word vocal style became the litmus paper for an array of sumptuous guitar tones.

In that respect, nothing much has changed on ‘Driving On The 44’ his first album for 2 years. The cinematic title could almost be a metaphor for his songs which are all blues based, but as on the shuffle tinged ‘Ain’t No Secret Thing’ offers clever word plays: “I could never make it out why I couldn’t make it in, but maybe I can make it right, brush away those sins.”

He often cast himself in the role as a story telling narrator, who leaves plenty of room for intricate interplay with pianist Max Middleton. Being a covid era recording the extraneous solos were probably dropped in, but it never detracts from an album full of restraint and subtle dynamics.

There’s a lovely lightness of touch on ‘Fresh Water’, an extended opener with a piano-led fusion feel, on which Snowy’s gentle notes hover over a beautiful arrangement helmed by his own bass playing and punctuated by his son Thomas’s exaggerated cymbal crashes.

It’s the perfect groove to lever us into an album full of subtle rock, blues, funk, and fleeting jazzy and Latino influences. There’s a sudden synth wash at 2.06 which feels as if the band are checking out their options, before Snowy adds a Spaghetti western tremolo sound over Latino percussion.

Much like the album as a whole, ‘Fresh Water’ takes its time to build steadily and resolutely as the solos always serve the song.

Middleton’s piano conjures up images of waves on a far off distant shore, while White adds a plaintive solo on a perfect opening track.

The whispered vocal and gentle instrumentation of ‘Longtime Blues’ gives it a reflective feel, while the funky ‘Way Down In The Dark’, adds an organ and up-in-the-mix bass, as if to help underpin some heartfelt, but acerbic lyrics.

The title track benefits from a double guitar harmony opening and a pulsating groove, over which Snowy half speaks his colourful narrative with some Knopfler style guitar.

Stylistically it’s a template for the album as a whole. He subtly builds the groove, swaps tones and then goes back to the opening double lines again to cleverly evoke the steady rolling motion of a freeway with a 70 mph speed limit. Yep, he’s ‘Driving On The 44′ and we’re in the back seat.

He’s in his element on ‘Blues 22’, a mellow blues featuring a ripping solo which he announces with a priceless; “here it comes”.

He’s in the same blues zone on the ‘after hours’ blues shuffle of ‘Slinky Too’. Max Middleton doubles on low-down B3 and piano and is the perfect foil for Snowy’s incisive tone, which for all the word sounds like a late night conversation.

And when not seeking out the melodic contours of song with a vocal that the German’s call Sprechstimme, he’s even more eloquent on his guitar. The solo here is expressive, poised and eloquent and leads to the staggered disguised outro.

There’s a real fluidity to this album on which the lyrics, guitar and subtle band interplay all support the songs organically.

The outstanding ‘Keep On Flying’ encapsulates everything Snowy is about. It’s a very full sounding track for a duo, as Snowy plays acoustic and electric guitar, synth and bass, while son Tom anchors the track with some muscularity.

His warm tone at 2.47 lifts the track to another level to evoke the aspirational nature of the song: “if you keep reaching for the sky, one day you will find what you’ve been searching for.

If you keep on flying high, the light will surely shine on you. Keep on trying, keep on flying.”

This is a signature Snowy White track on which his plaintive solo combines technique and emotion with echoes of Peter Green.

It’s juxtaposed by the Santana influenced ‘One Woman Girl’, complete with Gregg Rolie style B3 stabs. It’s certainly an uplifting track with lovely piano flurries, but sounds slightly contrived compared to what’s gone before.

There’s still room for the current single ‘Lady Luck (So Mean To Me)’ curiously chosen as the album closer. It’s a sparse funky groove fattened by cool slide, a tremulous solo and rich percussion from Thomas.

‘Driving On The 44’ is an album made with love, care and attention. It feels like meeting an old friend who is still pursuing the same passion all these years later. In doing so Snowy White restates his case as one of the most underrated blues guitarist of our era. ****

Review by Pete Feenstra

Featured Artist: JOSH TAERK

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Power Plays w/c 9 December 2024

In this sequence we play ‘The Best of 2024′ GRTR! reviewer selections

Featured Albums w/c 9 December 2024

09:00-12:00 The Best of 2024 (Melodic Rock)
12:00-13:00 The Best of 2003-2024 (Melodic Hard Rock)
14:00-16:00 The Best of 2024 (Singer Songwriter)