Tommy,
I recieved your most excellent CDs. I played some cuts from "MAILBOX
MONEY" on the show last week and I'm hoping to do some from "Outside
Looking In" this Friday. Both are great, fun CDs. Jerry really likes them
too. Your writing style is so much fun that it's infectous on the ears.
You just gotta hear more! I'll write up a review for our Natchel Blues
Network newsletter and web site on one of your CDs and try to drive some
new customers and fans your way. (http://www.natchelblues.org/)
Thanks for send me the two CDs. Our listeners thank you too. Jerry and I
(with our ladies - or maybe not!) have to make a roadtrip down your way
soon to check out that infamous Buckingham Blues Bar of yours.
Keep playin' 'da blues, my friend.
  Brian "The Bluesman" Beachum
222 West 21st Street
Suite F-136
Norfolk, VA 23517
www.bluesmanva.com
info@bluesmanva.com
88.7FM The Bee Bop Boogie Blues Review - Fridays 6-7pm
  www.natchelblues.org         Tommy Lee Cook & Co. have done it again with their latest effort, MAILBOX MONEY.
It is quite simply 48:02 of distinctive style performance and pure listening pleasure.
Trying to select a favorite song of the 11 Tommy & Danny Shepard penned & play on this CD
is harder than picking the best-looking dancer in a Vegas showgirl lineup.
  They "gulf coast rock n' roll" on LITTLE BLACK DRESS & on HUMAN NATURE.
CERTIFIED FOOL & COME TO ME are slow-down gems. The title track is spot-on.
And if you're not smiling from ear to ear listening to ME AND RUSSELL CROWE,
well, there's somethin' seriously wrong with 'ya . . . get yourself to a doctor, son.
  I pitch bands only when they walk the talk - - I've staked my reputation on that.
Tommy Lee Cook is the brightest shining "hidden gem" since Chuck Page in 2005.
I urge you to purchase this CD and tell your friends to do the same . . . you will
not be disappointed. Both axemen kick out the licks with their pickin' sticks,
the production is crisp & clean and Tommy Lee's vocals sound better than ever.
  LITTLE BOY BLUE, Rock 'n Roll Blues DJ
KPDO, 89.3 FM, Pescadero, CA (2010-2012)
KEGR, 97.7 FM, Concord, CA (2011)
  littleboy.blue@yahoo.com               Review from La Hora Del Blues, Vicente Zumel
  Tommy Lee Cook "Outside Looking In". Two Mules Music 2011.
  Once again, the hypnotic existential blues and the genuine Florida swamp sound of singer,
songwriter and guitar player Tommy Lee Cook, captivates us again in this last piece of work,
by the powerful and wonderful seduction of his music that flows with an enviable spontaneity,
together with ...the good work of the rest of musicians involved in this album. You will find
Tommy Lee Cook himself on acoustic and electric guitars, dobro, sequencers, lead and backing
vocals and Danny Shepard, electric guitar, backing vocals and sequencers, plus Pat 'Cleanhead'
Hayes harmonica, but especially the first two names are the real builders of this project.
All songs included on the cd are Tommy Lee's own ones who, together with Danny Shepard, have
done a hard work during several months, breaking their necks locked in the recording studio,
to produce a cool bright colorful work. GREAT.   www.dustyblues.com                 Part of the promo for what I feature on my Blues Show goes like this:
". . . Indy Artists who could be household names. . ."
The new Tommy Lee Cook CD "Outside Looking In' fits this declaration like a broken-in pair
of Tony Lama's. The first thing I did after listening to the CD all the way through was to listen
to it all the way through again. Band members Danny Shephard, Pat Hayes & Tommy Lee
rock 'n roll and do it with soul. Tasty stuff from top to bottom - and unlike a lot of CDs, all the
songs don't sound the same. It was as good as if Steve Earle, Jimmy Buffet & Jim Suhler had
formed a new group and cranked out a bunch of fresh material. Tommy Lee Cook will get
airplay on my Show, for sure . . . can't wait for the followup CD. Rock on, guys !
  Little Boy Blue
Rock 'n Roll Blues Show DJ
KPDO Radio, 89.3 FM, Pescadero, CA
www.kpdo.org
littleboy.blue@yahoo.com www.kpdo.org             Tommy Lee Cook - Outside Looking In
Two Mules Music
11 tracks Total time: 53:22
    Tommy Lee Cook, vocals and lead guitars, dobro, comes together with his partner, Danny Shepard,
electric rhythm guitars, to create on Outside Looking In a driving, forceful, elemental riffing music
that's positively hypnotic, and hypnotically positive. This is music that's part Delta blues electrified,
part Z.Z. Topp, and part modern Mississippi or early Chicago electric blues. Both men's guitars
are enhanced for a fuller sound through electronic programming that adds drums, piano, organ
and horn sounds. Recorded at Downtown Buckingham Studios in Ft. Myers, Florida, the CD
sleeve notes pay tribute to the patrons of their leading venue, Ft. Myers' World Famous
Buckingham Blues Bar, "Where the blues come alive". So it's a studio album that draws from
experienced live playing as well.
    As a vocalist, Tommy Lee Cook uses his versatile, Southern-drawl expressiveness to become a
consummate actor, giving each song a masterful, empathetic portrayal of the character singing
the song, and the emotions he feels. He does this across the gamut of 11 original songs here,
all penned jointly by Cook and Danny Shepard. These songs combine the storytelling aspects
of country with the emotional tone-poem painting of blues and the soul-baring emotiveness of
soul. Three of the songs are slow ballads, two of them about crumbling relationships, one
because it's not working out, the other, because the bottle got in the way. These are track 5,
"This Old Flame" and track 8, "Ain't No Blame", respectively. The third, track 10,
"The Truth About Lies," captures this storytelling essence paradigmatically, in a philosophical
song of going through it all, from up to down, as might be sung by Willie Nelson doing a
Kris Kristofferson song that's been put to a blues-soul melody.
    The remaining eight are medium-fast to fast blues with a touch of blues-rock, and they too run
a good gamut of themes. Three are directly woman songs. Track 5, "Grits And Groceries" and
track 7, "She's Got The Look", are songs of self-satisfaction for having a good woman that are
built respectively around food and movie motifs. "Arkansas Dirtweed", track 9, is a tale of romantic
frustration built around the women of his life pictured as treacherous drivers who leave him stranded.
The singer's made into a hitchhiker who's been dropped off in the middle of nowhere and surrounded
by nothing but—what else?—Arkansas dirtweed. "God's Little Acre", track 2, is an up-tempo blues
spiritual of coming to the Lord through being baptized in the muddy water and having one's soul
cleansed. Track 6, "Devil On My Shoulder", is the desperate lament of a sharecropper about to
be foreclosed on, contemplating whether to set fire to his barn as a fierce rainstorm looms and
finally comes. Track 3, "Take A Breath", is an ironic city blues of exasperation and irritation from
being stuck in on the only available barstool—right next to a nonstop marathon talker. Cook delivers
this one especially well, thoroughly capturing through gently humorous lyrics and delivery precisely
that trapped feeling that all of us can relate to. But all of these songs partake of Cook's outstanding
acting ability to project emotion thorough song. Method acting par excellence.
    The CD opens with an original that's put together, jigsaw puzzle-like, from all those old clichés
that abound in our language, "What You Gone Do," and ends with a fast-rockin' celebration,
"It's A Party," whose title says it all. On this number, Pat "Cleanhead" Hayes punctuates with
medium- and high-register amplified harp snorts. Outside Looking In has an insistent yet
comfortable ambience that takes us from outside to plunk us enjoyably on the sofa in the
living room, listening to the stereo blasting away with—what else?—the music of
Tommy Lee Cook and Danny Shepard!
    Reviewer George "Blues Fin Tuna" Fish hails from Indianapolis, Indiana, home of blues legends
Yank Rachell and Leroy Carr. He has written a regular music column for several years.
He wrote the liner notes for Yank Rachell's Delmark album, Chicago Style.
He has been a blues and pop music contributor for the left-wing press as well, and has appeared
in Against the Current and Socialism and Democracy.
  George "Blues Fin Tuna" Fish
Reviewer,
BluesBlast Online Magazine
http://www.illinoisblues.com/ www.illinoisblues.com                 Tommy Lee Cook - Outside Looking In
Two Mules Music
11 tracks Total time: 53:22
    The songs on Outside Looking In will take you someplace you've never been...
53 minutes in a place worth contemplating.   Local Band New Releases Article, The SWFL Spot Magazine   www.swflspot.com