MIKE ZITO "GREYHOUND" Source: The Morton Report Date: 07/2011 Writer: Bill Bentley

Mike Zito, Greyhound. There is nothing pretty about most Greyhound bus stations. They usually reside in the grimy part of town, and some of the people in them are no strangers to living behind locked doors. Sometimes, though, they're the only way out of town and when it's time to go are seen as the quickest route to anywhere else.

Blues-rocker Mike Zito has seen a few Greyhound stations, and it's gotten inside his music. He's got a switchblade attack on his Stratocaster guitar, and enough grit in his voice to sound like he knows how to sleep sitting up. In the past few years the man has been making albums that blend down home blues with uptown swagger, and come from a place that must be lived to be found. There are no shortcuts to where Zito is going, and it feels like he has the kind of persistence that says it's only a matter of time until he gets there.

This new set is produced by Anders Osborne in Lafayette, Louisiana and sounds like it. There is just enough mess in the mix to show this isn't some shiny shot at Southern showoff. Rather, this is what comes from a life lived upside down long enough to learn that right-sideup is both preferable and much more permanent. Mike Zito may be off the Greyhound but he's still on the bus, and that says it all.