The 56th album by the 73-year-old godfather of British blues is a tribute to one of his major influences, the late Texas-born guitarist Freddie King. It's also a nod to current Bluesbreakers picker Buddy Whittington, an underrated pyrotechnician who follows a long line of distinguished six-string Mayall sidemen that includes Eric Clapton, Peter Green, Mick Taylor, Coco Montoya, and Walter Trout. Whittington measures up, recreating the terse energy of King's biting, blunt phrasing on the legend's classic "Going Down" and the swinging "You Know That You Love Me." And he puts his own grinding, slashing brand on the riff  'n' rip guitar of "The Palace of the King," a biographical tune Don Nix, Leon Russell, and Duck Dunn wrote for King. Guest guitarist Robben Ford lends his own instrumental King homage, "Cannonball Shuffle," but it's Mayall's piano-led "King of the Kings" that's most touching. Singing in his arcing, high voice, slightly thinned by age, Mayall explains how King influenced him and his Bluesbreakers, showing Clapton, Green, and Taylor "all the licks to play," and concludes that he's "Got the blues for Mr. Freddie/Sorry that you had to go."--Ted Drozdowski