Fred Hostetler

Blues Back Pages

Mukthiland Records

Fred Hostetler is an Indiana born guitarist, singer-songwriter and author who has worked with major artists such as  Johnny Winter, Graham Parker, the Knack, Billy Squier, Jeff Beck and Grammy award winning producer Jack  Douglas. Along with Karen Lawrence he founded the  highly acclaimed California blues band “Blue By Nature”. His style while grounded in blues and Americana, cannot be defined by a single genre. He won the LA Music Critic  Award for Best Singer Songwriter 2019…and was nominated for Best Video 2019 ‘You Don’t Know What You Don’t Know’. He currently resides on Whidbey Island in the Pacific  Northwest.

“Blues Back Pages” is a collection of eleven handpicked  blues-based songs including eight originals and two selected covers. The tracks were pulled from his prolific output of recordings since returning home to the US from  India where he lived for seventeen years.

The album opens with “Hey Corporate Vandals” as Hostetler sings, “hey corporate vandals can’t you hear me when I call… why do you have to have it all…hey corporate vandals, your scandals…can’t you hear me when I call”. “Your Mind is on Vacation” is the classic Mose Allison song first recorded in 1967, re-arranged as an uptempo blues as Hostetler chimes “because your mind is on vacation and your mouth is working  overtime”.

“Taming the Wolf” is a seven minute autobiographical  narrative about time spent in India “I play the blues in an all white town, can’t you see…I’m on my way to blues heaven, they arrested me for murder in New York City,  wait a minute while your talkin’ this trash, I’m taming the wolf inside of me” the song ends with a Howlin’ Wolf type  howl. On “Deep Deep Well” Hostetler chants “I play the  blues in New Orleans in a deep, deep well, where I go  from here only the good lord knows, walkin’ down the road, destination unknown”.

On “Orphan Blues”, Hostetler cries out “well 3 AM in the  morning, I woke and sat up…I jumped outta bed and got down on my knees, it’s hard when your loved one has gone away, I don’t know what I’m gonna do, I’m a motherless child, I got the orphan blues”. On “Shelter from the Storm” Hostetler moans “I hear the wind howlin’ whispering through the trees…I’m trying to shelter from the storm, I’m lucky I ain’t dead, gonna shelter from the storm”.

On “Ain’t No Sunshine” a Bill Withers cover, first recorded by  Withers in 1971, Hostetler belts “there ain’t no sunshine when  she’s gone…she’s always gone too long, anytime she’s away… this house ain’t no home anytime she goes away, I know, I know, I know”. On “What’s Ahead and What’s Behind”, Hostetler shouts “I go around laughin’ anytime I see that babe, I just can’t stop worrying about what’s ahead and what’s behind…I got troubles up and down my mind, I just can’t stop worrying about what’s  ahead and what’s behind”.

“Rain on my Window Pane” is a song written by Karen  Lawrence as Hostetler groans “it rained all morning and  it’s pouring all afternoon…rain on my window pane, when my babe comes back, the sun is gonna shine”. On “New Man”  featuring a horn section, Hostetler bursts “my baby has given me what’s best for me, I’m back on my feet, I’m a new man now, I’m back on my feet, I’m a new man now I’m back on the street. In the closer, “You Found Me” Hostetler croons “you found me,  yes you found me, even though I was lost you caught up around me and you found me”.

Hostetler states “in 2017 I declined signing to Max’s Kansas  City Records as a solo artist, now forty years later I started over again with eight years of continuous releases. A few  people became aware of my songs. I felt that some of my earlier work, especially the blues songs…deserved to be  heard in a more focused blues session, what materialized is ‘Blues Back Pages’, it’s all part of the journey”.

Richard Ludmerer

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