The DETROIT Blues Society reviewed my latest album calling it “musical brilliance!”

“Eliza Neals’ “Thunder in the House” shakes the walls

By Jennifer Valdez

Throughout her career, Eliza Neals has stretched the blues genre, which is exactly what it needs. While many artists prefer basking in the safe and shallow end of the pool, applying their musical skills to interpretations – sometimes imitations – of true blues standards, Neals plies deeper water, her favorite stroke being the freestyle. “Thunder in the House” is her 13th and latest offering, an all-original nine-song release (E-H Records), on which the listener will be hard-pressed to find a traditional AAB pattern or stop-time tune.

And that’s a good thing. Because as much as blues enthusiasts – musicians and fans – adore the classics and want to hear them time after time, the genre needs to grow. Sure, the blues is American music’s sturdy old oak, but even mature trees sprout new leaves every spring. Neals no doubt gets that point, having written (or cowritten) every tune. She also laid down keyboards on many from the first track, “Speedy Beady” – a completely novel homage to “Little Red Rooster” that broadens the double entendre imagery to its limits – Neals’ voice claws in and doesn’t let the listener forget whose record this is. Wrapped in smoke and velvet, gravel and silk, it cuts through the rich instrumental fury and lingers after each song ends, like a pleasant aftertaste in your ear. Listen to Neals deliver the following: “He be laying in the dirt with his favorite church clothes on, feathers just like a sweater.”

Neals’ roots are pleasantly evident on “Thunder in the House.” A native Detroiter and Wayne State alumni who earned a music degree, Neals collaborated with Motown great Barrett Strong in the ’90s, releasing her initial pair of albums on Strong’s Blarrt Records label. And indeed, two uptempo tracks, “Wicked Heart” and “One Monkey (Don’t Stop No Show),” sound like imagined 21st-century tunes by the Supremes, Vandellas or Marvelettes, with Neals providing all the vocal parts. The former even nods to a Motown classic, title-checking “Nowhere to Run” in a vocal line; and dig the groovy Hammond work on the latter by Mark Leach.

Additional moments of musical brilliance are numerous. Check out the haunting vibes of “All Alone” and “Locked Up,” with Mike Puwal’s spicy guitar work on the latter creeping from shoulder to scream in the second half of the song.

Other reviews also offer high praise. “Neals delivers a swaggering and confident performance that her fans and blues rock lovers will find to their liking,” says Blues Blast magazine. “Walking thunder,” declares Blues Rock Review. “Another year, another record, another impressive body of work released by an artist like Eliza Neals that, rather deservedly, among the most inspired and strongest Blues and Soul singers and songwriters of the current American Music scene,” says BluesBlast Reviews.

“Thunder in the House” is available from various online sources, including – of course – www.elizaneals.com.” 

THANK YOU DBS see you next year on the road!