Hamid Reza Behzadian - Blues for Leila (Self Release)

The Slow Music Movement
5 days ago
2 min read

*** This blog post first appeared in TSMM's July 13th Newsletter, where you can get all the tips (and more) first ***

This is the cover art for Hamid Reza Behzadian's, Blues for Leila album showing geometric blue and teal pattern with orange border. Text reads "Blues for Leila" in English and stylized script, "Hamid Reza Behzadian."

The African roots of the blues have been well explored and disseminated over the last couple of decades, and no respectable world music festival would be without one of the many desert blues purveyors from sandier climes. Hamid Reza Behzadian from his well placed Dutch home is forging a new path though. Looking West to America and East to Persia and India to showcase his love for, and the affinity of the blues with the sounds of his distant homeland and its near neighbour, artfully fusing the sounds of his harmonica, both Indian and Western slide guitars and Iranian folk music.

Hamid Reza Behzadian in denim dungarees, wide brimmed hat and sunglasses sits cross-legged, flanked by Indian and American slide guitars. Stained glass window behind and a chandelier above create a warm ambiance.

Online information is again frustratingly thin on the ground, with no Bandcamp page and even his website making no mention of this latest release. In fact I only heard about it on a rare trawl through my Bluesky feed when TSMM favourite Golden Brown was enthusing about the release, what a stroke of luck - cheers mate!

Kicking off the album is “Zeeland’s Desert” that eases us in with some dusty, sun warped guitar as the first hints of the Indian influence raise their head before suddenly taking over with a burst of South East Asian percussion and string sounds that soar over the lolloping Western undertones. “Blues for Leila” fuses Persian and Southern Blues slide work, even hinting at flamenco’s Eastern ancestry, that’s how circular and unifying this recording is.

“Yellow Bride (Intro)” invents ambient harmonica, whilst the tracks main body introduces Persian percussion as the countries embrace and improvise rather than accuse and abuse for a change, and so it continues throughout this entrancing listen. Each country gets its moment in the sun, but borders are constantly breached, suspicions ignored, cultural diversity celebrated, precious age old sounds respectfully reshaped by foreign ideas into timeless cross-cultural fusions, politely suggesting as it goes that our so called leaders should be making music rather than war.

Available on all streaming services.