Joe Bonamassa - Dust Bowl [2LP]

Joe Bonamassa's Dust Bowl spreads across a gatefold double LP, a widescreen blues-rock record that finds the guitar virtuoso digging into roots music with some famous friends.

Released in 2011, it arrived during one of the busiest stretches of Bonamassa's career and was produced, like much of his catalogue, by Kevin Shirley. Sessions moved between Santorini in Greece, Nashville, Malibu and Los Angeles, and that restless geography shows up in the music, which ranges from heavy electric blues to dusty Americana.

The title track is a standout, moody and atmospheric, with Bonamassa's playing at its most lyrical. "Tennessee Plates" brings John Hiatt and Vince Gill aboard for a rollicking take on Hiatt's own song, and Gill returns on the easygoing "Sweet Rowena." Glenn Hughes adds his powerhouse voice to a fiery reading of Free's "Heartbreaker," one of the album's heaviest moments.

Beth Hart turns up too, and the mix of stinging solos, Hammond organ, a trumpet cameo and acoustic textures keeps the record varied rather than indulgent. Bonamassa's own songs hold their ground beside the covers, and his singing has rarely sounded so relaxed.

For blues-rock fans it is one of his most rounded albums, and it sounds made for a slow evening and a good pair of speakers.