Aki Kumar – God Bless the USA

With Blues music there’s an age old conflict that quietly rages involving tradition and innovation. “That’s not Blues” vs “You’re doing the same thing over and over again” are the 2 defining mantras.

Difficult to reference anybody who has ever appeased both camps but here comes Aki Kumar and his like minded mates that organically appear to have done both.

Organically could also be termed effortlessly or not premeditated. Innovation for innovation’s sake never works. Same with tradition for tradition’s sake.

Arriving at such a place takes time.

A lot of Time.

Aki built a recording studio and taught himself how to operate it. As a harp player he also took on learning to play drums well enough that other band leaders have hired him for gigs.

Impressive.

Even more impressive is his natural ability to make good decisions about the music, the lyrics and the look. His previous Little Village releases, Aki Goes To Bollywood and Hindi Man Blues clearly demonstrate that.

In this era the Blues music tradition given a new look is refreshing.

Listen and see for yourself.

Note from Aki Kumar:

God Bless The USA is the fulfilment of a long-standing dream of mine to self-produce a blues album in my garage on my own schedule, using minimal gear and software, while putting to use some basic engineering and mixing skills I acquired during the 2020 pandemic shutdown.

I would like to thank all my fellow musicians who contributed their time, talents and insights to this project. Thanks also to Little Village Foundation, Jim Pugh, Denise McNair for their long-standing support. Thoughts and Prayers is brought to you courtesy of San Jose Jazz. Last, but not the least, thanks to Bunni, Yuko, Poirot and Mowgli for putting up with all my musical cacophony.