Guitar Shorty is one of the most flamboyant live performers on the blues circuit today; his typical show includes lengthy strolls through the crowd, solos played with his teeth, karate kicks, and 360-degree flips while playing his guitar. His recordings can"t hope to capture these antics, but they do reveal that the veteran has combined the agile, high-pitched, single-note guitar style of such heroes as B.B. King and T-Bone Walker with the early-soul vocal stylings of Ray Charles and Sam Cooke who both hired the young David "Guitar Shorty" Kearney as a road guitarist. The seven Kearney originals on the New Orleans-recorded Get Wise to Yourself are little more than serviceable blues-genre exercises, but the handful of cover tunes reveal just how entertaining Guitar Shorty can be in the right circumstances. --Geoffrey Himes