Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

Everyone always asks for proof, or at least they should, when being presented with a fact or piece of information. However The Proof is there for listening to when it comes to Paul Cox, Roger Cotton, Mike Summerland, Nigel Hardy and Peter Stroud, the proof is not just a satisfactory edible pudding but it is five course meal with additional toppings that deserves the best chef to present it.

100% The Proof has all the attributes of a selection box in which no matter track you choose to delve into, you will always come up trumps and find a tasty morsel in which to slaver over. Not only are the combination of five musicians evidence of something rather good going on, something almost insatiable to the ears but when you are able to have the legendary Micky Moody and Snowy White come along and play like they are in the middle of a dream reunion of early Whitesnake or any part of Snowy’s lengthy period at the helm of a beautiful guitar, then all you can do is draw a big line around you, place a do not disturb sign around your neck and let the Blues take you where it will.

Like Jazz, Blues doesn’t seem to have been this popular for many years; certainly in the U.K. where the abundance of it seems to be in such a healthy state that a good pathologist would declare the genre resistant to any outside attack by music that would quite frankly be better off in a morgue.

The Proof, were it needed is throughout, it doesn’t take a genius employed on an consultancy basis to realise that tracks such as Feel So Bad, the Steve Winwood cover of Can’t Find My Way Home, Are You Made of Gold and Until The Well Runs Dry  are not just outstandingly beautiful but also evidence of greater things to come.

100% The Proof is testimony that British Blues never really went away, it just needed to be heard above the noise.

Ian D. Hall