It’s all in the fingers. I rave about a lot of cats who come through Lethbridge, but  Fredericton, New Brunswick’s Ross Neilsen and the Sufferin’ Bastards are quickly becoming one of my favourite live acts.

 They blew in to the Slice, Oct. 19 and tore the roof off the place. But if it wasn’t for a table of rugby playing friends of friends of the band, there might have been six people in the audience.

Neilsen and his trio was playing energetic delta blues on steroids, but amped up and turned up. And the magic all came from his fingers, as Neilsen strummed with his  pinkie, ring and middle finger while playing bass notes with his thumb and solos plus big ’70s style riffs with this thumb and his index finger.

 He has just released a couple new live CDs — an acoustic CD and a sweet new live electric CD called “What You Need Vol. 2. His second set included most of that CD, which  mostly includes live versions of his last studio CD “Redemption.”
 His band was supremely tight, with the bassist playing in the pocket and the drummer keeping perfect time.
 Neilsen got lost in his music, played some slinky slide and was reminiscent of the dirty Texas fried blues in the vein of Grady.