"The Black-eyed Snakes are a right-thinking music fan's nightmare. They're white guys from Duluth playing rubbed-raw blues. · And they cover a Moby song that itself sampled a blues artist ("Honey"). Look past the racial weirdness, though, to the Snakes' discovery of a secret place where Low, the Fall, and Willie Dixon all have something to say to one another. Then dance, fool."

"This time, I just know what I want," announces the protagonist before launching into the self-redefining, hell-bent-for-Gene-Vincent opener "Chicken-Bone George," and all wheels are off. When 40 minutes later he dedicates the sweet kiddie-blues coda "Cheerios on the Floor" to his "little girl, hollerin’ Holace May," you get the distinct feeling that speed and distilled spirits aren't driving this myth of greased lightning, but that the heartland’s got a lot more to do with it.

"In his beat-thwacking, voice-distorting, primal blooze threesome the Black Eyed Snakes, front man Chicken Bone George has something to tell us, and it goes a little something like this: "People, have you heard of a better day" "I say again, have you ever heard of a better day.. That's called hope." Then he'll fire into a Muddy Waters rocker or a Moby number, mercilessly slashing his guitar and stomping his feet from that traditional bluesman throne, the folding chair. Few in the audience will be sitting down, though: Black-eyed Snakes fans seem caught up in that old Minnesota yearning for a Southern blur of intemperance and contrition, Saturday night and Sunday morning rolled into one."

"In the dozen or so years of the Bayfront Blues Festival, never has it featured a more appropriate opening act than the Black-eyed Snakes. Born on the hillside overlooking Bayfront Festival Park, the 'Snakes aint one of your Clapton/Stevie Ray wannabe bands that saturated the blues with mundane predictability throughout the 90s. They are the Central Hillside blues - loud, fresh and growing from ancient roots."

"The Black Eyed Snakes are another outlet for the restless creative energy of Low's Al Sparhawk, whose alter ego Chicken Bone George wails distorted vocals through a harmonica mic to thrash-blues accompaniment. Just as Low are subversive in their minimalism, the Snakes are subversive in their raw punk energy, stealing the blues back from the Kenny Wayne Shepherds of this world. "