Rhino / Wea
2002
Testament - The Complete Slash Recordings
About This Album
"We got the Louisiana boogie and the Delta blues/We got country swing and rockabilly, too/We got jazz, country western, and Chicago blues/It's the greatest music that you ever knew." Dave Alvin was writing about "American Music" in his song of the same name when he penned those lines, but while he would never be quite so arrogant as to say so himself, he could have been talking about his band, the Blasters, who used the song as the title track of their first album. While often lumped in with the L.A. rockabilly scene that rose up in the wake of punk rock, from the start the Blasters displayed a wide-ranging musical diversity that set them far apart from, say, Levi and the Rockats. The Blasters were a supremely tight and tasteful band with enough fire, smarts, and passion for two or three groups. Phil Alvin was a singer who knew how to communicate the grand gesture while still touching the small details; his brother, Dave Alvin, was a peerless songwriter who could honor the artists who influenced him while finding a distinct and memorable voice of his own (he could play a mean guitar to boot), and John Bazz and Bill Bateman were a strong and swinging rhythm section. The Blasters cut two superb albums for Slash Records that raised the bar for the entire 1980s and '90s roots rock movement, 1981's The Blasters and 1983's Non Fiction, and a great live EP, 1982's Over There: Live at the Venue, London.
Track List

Disc 1 (try tracks 1,4,7,15,19 and 22)

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Disc 2 (try tracks 1,6,9,11 and 14)

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