Clay's Back to Blue

Clay's Back To Blue

Bruce Von Stiers

Clay Melton is just in his mid ‘20's but has already made quite a splash in the world of blues rock. The International Guitar Festival in Dallas named Clay as one of the top guitarist under the age of 20. He was in his mid-teens at that time. Clay has opened for Robert Cray and Chris Daughtry. Clay is from Louisiana but finds his home in Texas now.

In 2017, Clay released his first full length album, Burn The Ships. The album was a big success for Clay and earned him a whole bunch of new fans.

This year Clay is releasing a 5 song EP. The title of the EP is Back to Blue. Four of the songs were either written or co-written by Clay. The fifth song is a cover, but more on that later. The EP has a run time of 19 minutes. It is being released by Watchtower Entertainment.

Back To Blue was primarily produced and engineered by Danny Jones. He is a Grammy winner who's worked with many greats such as Bo Diddley and Michael McDonald. Danny plays the tambourine on a couple of songs. Two of the songs were produced by Sebastian Cure, a top music producer in Austin.

Clay's core band is him, Zach Grindle and Raymon Minton. Zach plays drums and does percussion. Raymon plays bass. Clay takes the lead with vocals and guitar.

Helping out on the EP are Dan Smith, Billy Justineau and Danny Jones, who I mentioned earlier. Billy, a member of the Brothers Osborne plays organ and Wurlitzer piano. Dan, a noted veteran musician, plays bass on three of the songs on the EP.

The title track, Back to Blue, is up first. It is a moody, guitar laden tune. Clay's throaty vocals in front make this a really cool blues rock piece.

Excuses is a head-bopping, kick ass blues infused rock piece.

There are two songs on the EP that were recorded live. The first one is Says That You Love Me. It has great vocals and killer guitar.

The second song that was recorded live is Texas Cyclone. It is an instrumental with super cool blues rock guitar.

I think that one of the best songs on the ZZ Top album, Tres Hombes, is Jesus Just Left Chicago. Clay and the band provide a superb rendition of the song as the final track on the EP. Although it holds pretty true to the original, Clay adds a few of his own touches to the song.

With Back To Blue, Clay Melton has shown that he is becoming a force to be reckoned with in the world of blues rock. Not only does Clay have great throaty, raspy vocals, the music showcases how gifted a guitarist he is.

Back to Blue is set to be released on July 23rd .

To learn more about Clay Melton, visit https://claymelton.com/

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