Unfettered by convention, blues superheroes Andrew Duncanson, Ronnie Shellist, and one-man-band Gerry Hundt unite as The Dig 3. Whiskey vocals, masterful harmonica, and keen original songs stay tethered to grooves only possible when the rhythm section is one person. Walking the tightrope between urgency and ease, Dig 3 creates roots music with power and subtlety - perfected by decades of house-parties and honky tonks.
The Dig 3 have a real knack for attaining blues nirvana … down at the bottom of the gutbucket.
Down there where old-school, blunt-force musicianship, bruising rhythms and dirty decibels pummel the very thought of bombastic peacocking. Down there, rumbling in allegiance to the blues’ dogma of: Lower the altitude to jack the attitude. Down there where Chicago roughhousers like one-armed Big John Wrencher, grindmaster Big Smokey Smothers, and the 12-fingered tornado that was Hound Dog Taylor used to work their magic. More simply put: Way down there where primal blues always do their damnedest....
read more
Unfettered by convention, blues superheroes Andrew Duncanson, Ronnie Shellist, and one-man-band Gerry Hundt unite as The Dig 3. Whiskey vocals, masterful harmonica, and keen original songs stay tethered to grooves only possible when the rhythm section is one person. Walking the tightrope between urgency and ease, Dig 3 creates roots music with power and subtlety - perfected by decades of house-parties and honky tonks.
The Dig 3 have a real knack for attaining blues nirvana … down at the bottom of the gutbucket.
Down there where old-school, blunt-force musicianship, bruising rhythms and dirty decibels pummel the very thought of bombastic peacocking. Down there, rumbling in allegiance to the blues’ dogma of: Lower the altitude to jack the attitude. Down there where Chicago roughhousers like one-armed Big John Wrencher, grindmaster Big Smokey Smothers, and the 12-fingered tornado that was Hound Dog Taylor used to work their magic. More simply put: Way down there where primal blues always do their damnedest.
2022’s self-titled debut—ranked #3 Best Blues Album of that year by MOJO—got the wrecking ball swinging. “Double Cross,” “Reposado Rock” and, of course, the bottleneck-blitzed “Tell Me the Place” were among the hellraisers that shook the shack. The hourlong time warp—pooling power from the three perfectly crusty old-souls of Andrew Duncanson (vocals, guitar), Ronnie Shellist (harmonica) and Gerry Hundt (anything and everything, right down to foot drums), whose credentials trace through the likes of Kilborn Alley and Nick Moss’ Flip Tops—blasted open a passageway to let the thrillingly wild spirit of Chicago’s blue past roar into the present. The Dig 3 were here in no uncertain terms. Deal with it.
Damn The Rent now takes over from there. Duncanson still grabs you by the collar with every lyric he barks out atop heavyset, do-as-I-say grooves muscling you where to go while dictating at what speed to do it. (The immolating “Dip My Toe,” for instance, gets you huffing). And what you hear was cut live in the studio, without any doctoring, in, essentially, one day. Pure raw blues, the way Nature intended.
The 12 originals fan out. A thick John Lee Hooker throb sets “Big Water” to sloshing back and forth, its deep swells strafed by the album’s ever-tough harp. “Gold Tooth” sails on the breezes coming off Hundt’s blue mandolin getting fanned à la Maxwell Street kingpin Johnny Young. “Old Dog” airdrops the trio onto a 1930s street corner, with hokum-style kazoo buzzing away above their six tapping feet. “All the Love That I Got” branches into bona fide soul territory, right down to its bended-knee confession and the kind of meaty bounce that Percy, Otis or Marvin could never muster. Nor can you sit out “Coconut Curry Dance” and “Blanco Boogaloo” due to their wicked hip-shake. “Southern Fantasy” even circles back from The Dig 3 as a bonus, shockingly reborn as Halsted Street disco-funk, showcasing what’s possible with The Dig 3 BIG, a special, expanded edition of the band. Yet, the rubberized “Chuck & Willie” cannot be beat as an endorphin high, triggered by a barbed-wire guitar solo and the fantastically cheesy organ doing cartwheels. Just perfect for circus parades or crocked romps around the yard. Damn The Rent, bless the brawn, and pass the bottle.
If you’re drowning in a sea of “blooz” mediocrity, you need to check out the Dig 3. The Chicago-based trio delivers no-nonsense blues free of affectation.
show less
