You know immediately when you're in the presence of real class. It's like comparing David Beckham with a pub footballer, both use boots and a ball but the results are a world apart. Others try to do what Benoit and Thackery do; few come close. And with Charlie Musselwhite, Reese Wynans and Tommy Shannon as 'back up' this album boasts a formidable cast list.

The sound is crisp and sharp and Benoit's voice cuts through it all like a laser beam. The opening track, "I Ain't Broke" is not only a metaphor for the whole album, the good-time feel shakes out the cobwebs. It would be very easy to become mesmerized by the scale of Benoit and Thackery's talent. Voice and guitar alone offer more than many other albums can dream of. But you could overlook the delights of "Nice and Warm" and the brilliance of the cover of, (re-imagining I believe is the current buzzword), Dylan's "Leopard-Skin Pill-Box Hat." How do you do Dylan differently? Easy, be as good as Benoit and Thackery. Mind you, with so much good stuff going on "behind the scenes",  a reviewer has to have his wits about him. Musselwhite and Wynans in particular are no shrinking violets.

In a way, it is strange to realize that this is a spare and sparse album  There's no unnecessary "business" going on. Whiskey Store (the album) has the immediacy of a live performance. It is hard to believe that the album isn't a complete recording rather than being spliced together.

In an album of the unexpected, Neil Young's "Unknown Legend" is a real showstopper, simple and understated it's a collective drawing of breath before the exertions to come. Then it's back to basics. "Bad Luck Blues" - ain't they all - has Benoit and Musselwhite competing to see who can ache the most. Classic blues, classily done. It's really only because of the spellbinding brilliance of what has gone before that "Freddy's Combo" suffers a little and seemed a little flat and formulaic. Maybe we'd come to expect too much.  But after those "blips" the album signs off as it began, in grand style, with "Bone Pickin'" and on "Whiskey Store," style really means style.