Chris Ruest And Gene Taylor - It's Too Late Now

It's Too Late Now was born after Gene Taylor relocated to Austin, TX, from Belgium, and began to work with Chris Ruest. The set covers a wide range of blues history. Taylor opens with Crazy Mixed Up World; powers through Blue Smitty's Date Bait, another post-war Chicago classic; and turns to an earlier era with the lilting Lost and Lonely Child. Ruest's witty, New Orleans-inspired Keep Talking features his switchblade guitar over a Professor Longhair-esque piano figure and second-line drums. Taylor plays Little Johnny Jones to Ruest's Elmore James on That Will Never Do, and cuts loose on the jumping Torpedo Boogie. The band pushes I Tried, a sizzling, Texas-style rocker, into the stratosphere. Ruest's lowdown Mr. Policeman comes across like a lost side from the early Sun Records days; I'm Down rides a nervous, country blues rhythm. Taylor submits two gospel-inflected songs: the rollicking Too Late to Stop Now, with its slamming backbeat, and Slipping Away, which ends the set on a spiritual note.