All of Definition of a Circle are evident on “They Wore Blue,” which Taylor describes in the liner notes thusly: “While watching television coverage of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in the South, an African-American man from the North wonders who will help.” There’s only one verse—“What would you do / if they wore blue / would you help them / would you help them too? / What would you do / if you had food / would you feed them / would you feed them too?” As enigmatic as the significance of blue seems, the song is powerful, with Taylor layering electric and echoed acoustic guitar fills over an essentially static backing.

 

Otis Taylor’s blues are self-consciously art, with unconventional instrumentation including the cello—on “Lifetime of Freedom,” he employs four. He takes the essentially repetitive structure of blues to the logical conclusion, often reducing songs to a one or two-chord vamp over which he sings and plays guitar, banjo or piano. The lyrics are typically spare, often only a handful of phrases that gain or change meanings as they are repeated over the song’s three or four minutes. The songs typically have a strong social consciousness as well, even if that isn’t obvious from the lyrics alone. There’s an intriguing privacy to Taylor’s art, and his love of drones makes it all the more subtle and hypnotic.