Two years ago in these pages, I was a little disappointed with Steve Howell's previous release, Yes, I Believe I Will (28 December 2013). It was a promising album but, to these ears, it as a little too laid back, a little too -- to use the term I used then -- "polite." For a bluesman who had his life turned around when he first heard Mississippi John Hurt and the other early Delta bluesmen, he did not sound fully committed.

Funny the difference a single album can make. It's two years later, and Howell is back with Friend Like Me, a much more closely focused album and a much more sincere one. This time around, Howell has mainly stuck to the blues from the early generation -- Charlie Patton, "Bukka" White, Reverend Gary Davis and Jesse "Baby Face" Thomas -- and he does them well. There's a deep level of feeling here; these come across as songs that Howell loves and loves to sing. His voice isn't the greatest but it fits these sings pretty well -- he gets around nicely, if not spectacularly on vocals.

What allows him to flourish despite the sameness of his vocals is the guitar work, generally a balance between Piedmont-style finger-picked acoustic rhythm and blazing electric leads. Guitar work abounds on the album. Howell loves to stretch out himself, and he gives electric guitarist Chris Michaels lots of room to maneuver also. The arrangements and soloing on the record is extensive and exceptional.

After eight tunes, Howells seems to feel a need to bring the music up to date, so he abandons the early stuff does an interpretation of John Phillips' great song, "Me & My Uncle." Where Judy Collins did it as a cowboy song and the Grateful Dead did an uptempo version as a jam, Howells slows it down, makes it a western blues and, as a result, brings out the irony in the song. It's a beautiful version and a highlight of the album; had it closed out the album, any listener would have gone away delighted. It is followed, though, by a version of Manfred Mann's 1966 hit "Pretty Flamingo," which when I first heard it, had me asking, "Why?" Coming right after "Me & My Uncle," "Pretty Flamingo" sounds weak and serves to close the disc on a down note.

We do have the power, though, to cut off whatever device we're listening on before the last song, though. That ability saves the album.