Darren's latest album is 2020's Getting Sober For The End Of The World. Self-recorded and produced at his home studio Lamington Recording, the record features many of the same brilliant musicians as 2018's Too Many Millionaires. It also has a cameo from Mavis Staples musical director and West Coast blues guitar legend Rick Holmstrom. It was nominated Best Folk Album at the 2021 Aotearoa Music Awards.
Too Many Millionaires was Darren's first all-acoustic album. It was recorded live at Wellington's Surgery Studios over a weekend in late 2017 and released in May 2018. It spent over six weeks on the NZ Album Charts. The band features ex-Chicago Smoke Shop harmonica legend Terry Casey in fine form alongside Delia Shanly on percussion, Steve Moodie on double bass, and Dayle Jellyman on piano.
Prestigious US magazine Blues Revue says:
"New Zealand's Darren Watson has crafted a beautiful album in Saint Hilda's Faithless Boy (Red Rocks Records), a set of backward-looking (but by no means retro) blues recorded with a bracing, contemporary sonic treatment. Watson pops his guitar strings like Johnny 'Guitar' Watson on She Got It All, mines soulful, Robert Cray territory on Love Is An Ocean, and channels Howlin' Wolf in full, stomping intensity on A Desperate Man. Dig the swampy roots-rocker He Don't Love You, the serpentine The Bitter Suite, and the acoustic slide reading of My Love Will Never Die - leagues from Otis Rush's original stylistically, right there emotionally. Watson's hearty vocal approach sounds utterly honest. The supporting cast is superb."
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