Joe Bonamassa felt that he was getting away from his roots, so for Different Shades of Blue the guitar virtuoso and former prodigy sat down and wrote every tune himself for the first time in his career—with the exception of a brief intro from Hendrix’s canon, “Hey Baby (New Rising Sun).” The result is one of Bonamassa’s most honest, earthy releases to date. Helmed, as most of his recordings are, by producer Kevin Shirley, Different Shades is, of course, populated by the sort of crunchy guitar-rock and funkadelica that’s always been Bonamassa’s stock in trade. On “Heartache Follows Wherever I Go,” he turns in a fluid, wah-and-fuzz-drenched solo that most of today’s pretenders to the blues-rock throne can only dream of creating. But there are tender moments, too—the title track, spare and soulful, cuts to the bone with both subtlety and raw guts, its biting licks never leaving behind the song’s memorable melody.