Slipstream

Hardly anyone remembers it anymore, but Bonnie Raitt made some of her very first recordings just up the road from here at Paxton Lodge, deep in the Feather River canyon, where Elektra Records once had a studio. That was more than four decades ago, long before that trademark streak of white hair appeared in Raitt’s red mane. She’s given lots of fans lots of pleasure in the years since then, and she remains a slide guitar standard bearer. In the track that leads off this collection—“Used to Rule the World”—she sings a song that speaks to and for her generation, with lyrics that take note of the passage of time since 1975, leaving so many “mystified/ standin’ with the rest of us/ who used to rule the world.” If you don’t understand that line, just give it a little time, brother, and you surely will. This is Raitt, emotionally honest, sometimes tender, sometimes raw, singing and playing with the power she’s always brought to her game, covering Bob Dylan on a couple tracks, and making her own testament on a bunch of new songs, all with the distinctive sound that ensures that, though younger voices are pushing her generation toward the exit, she still rocks, and she still rules her world.