ALBUM REVIEW: Samantha Fish Burns the House Down

Heading towards her second decade as a blues phenomenon, Kansas City guitarist/vocalist Samantha Fish’s Paper Doll (Live at the Bijou) asserts her veteran status with a blast of high-octane grunge. Over her career, Fish has explored a range of styles, from the country Americana of

Jun 11, 2026 - 15:07

ALBUM REVIEW: Samantha Fish Burns the House Down

Heading towards her second decade as a blues phenomenon, Kansas City guitarist/vocalist Samantha Fish’s Paper Doll (Live at the Bijou) asserts her veteran status with a blast of high-octane grunge.

Over her career, Fish has explored a range of styles, from the country Americana of 2017’s (fantastic) Belle of the West to the trashy raunch-rock of 2021’s (also fantastic) Faster. Live, though, Fish tends to hew closer to those blues roots. This is adamantly not a weakness; on the contrary, it’s a thrill to hear Fish draw out Screamin’ Jay Hawkins’ “I Put a Spell On You” into a seven-minute workout, complete with a show-stopping, razor-edged solo that touches on Elmore James and Jimme Paige before lighting its own bucketfuls of kerosene. Her version of her own “Bulletproof” is similarly vicious, exchanging the studio version’s slick, amphetamine production for a muddier, sensuous swamp-wallow, as she trades off between the sensuous roar of her vocals and the sensuous roar of her guitar.