BILL WYMAN & The Rhythm Kings:

ANYWAY THE WIND BLOWS

Just a few mates having a good time is how BILL WYMAN describes ANYWAY THE WIND BLOWS, the former Rolling Stone's second album with his loose all-star roots ensemble the Rythm Kings. Like it's predecessor, 1998's Struttin Our Stuff, the 14-song Anyway The Wind Blows teams bassist, songwriter, producer, and sometime vocalist Wyman with a stellar assortmant of musical comrades for a spirited, expertly played set of vintage covers and classically-styled originals that transcend retro revivalism in favor of the earthy energy of the classics that first turned Wyman into an R & B, jazz, and blues enthusiast and inspired him to play rock-n-roll.

,,These are the kind of songs I grew up with", states Wyman. "When I was young, whenever I heard blues artists, it always sounded like it truly came from the heart and that they believed every word they sang. That feeling has always stuck with me, and that's the atmosphere that we tried to capture on this record."

Like its predecessor, Anyway the Wind Blows spotlights an impressive roster of talent. In addition to the core lineup of Wyman on bass, vocalist Beverly Skeete (who sings lead on eight songs), guitarist Terry Taylor, pianist Dave Hartley and drummer Graham Broad, the album features guitar work from such esteemed Wyman pals as Eric Clapton, Peter Frampton, Albert Lee, Andy Fairweather-Low, Chris Rea, Martin Taylor, and former Stone Mick Taylor, along with two of British rock's most influential keyboardists, R&B-pop legend Georgie Fame ad Procol Harum leader Gary Brooker. Fame also handles lead vocal on four songs, with additional guest singers Paul Carrack and Mike Sanchez each stepping up to the mike to sing lead on one track.

The song selection is as varied as the cast, with originals like, "Ring My Bell", "A True Romance", and "Crazy he Calls Me" living up to the lofty standards set by such classic numbers as the J.J. Cale-penned title tune, Willie Dixon's "Too Late", Mose Allison's "Days Like This", Dan Hicks "Walking One 7 Only", and the Clasics IV hit "Spooky".

After leaving the Rolling Stones in 1992, Wyman initially kept busy with a multitude of nonmusical projects. But the pull of his first love eventually proved too strong to resist. "When I left the Stones, I just kind of got on with my life, and I kind of put music out of my mind," he recalled. "But after a couple of year, I found that I really missed it. I didn't want the pressure of trying to make hit singles, I just wanted to make music for the fun of it. I wanted to be able to record anything I liked, from any era and in the style, commercial or not. And people responded really positively, which was quite a nice surprise."

For the sessions-which procceeded at an organically informal pace over the coarse of a year and yielded upwards of 60 tracks, Wyman placed emphasis on spontaneity and feel over note perfect precision. "All this stuff was first, second, or third takes, we didn't want it to get stiff or lose the emtion, and we didn't want to record anything if everyone wasn't enjoying it."

Halfway through his stint with the Rolling Stones, Wyman became the first member of the group to launch a solo career with the well-received albums Monkey Grip(1974), Stone Alone(1976), and Bill Wyman(1982). The latter disc included the tongue-in-cheek international smash single "(Si Si) Je Suis un Rock Star" and its similarly successful follow-up "Come Back Suzanne". Wyman made his debut as a film composer with his soundtrack for the Ryan O'Neal/ Omar Shariff movie Green Ice and scored two features renowned cult horror director Dario Argento. In 1983, moved by the illness of faces bassist Ronnie Lane, Wyman participated in a series of high profile benefit concerts to benefit the charity Artists for Research into Multiple clerosis. Those shows helped inspire Wyman to launch the rootsy rock-blues combo Willie

and the Poorboys, for those eponymous 1985 LP he enlisted such ARMS participants as Jimmy Page, Paul Rodgers, Kenny Jones, and fellow Stones Charlie Watts and Ron Wood. That ensemble eventually released a second album, Tear It Up, in 1994.

The years since his departure from the Rolling Stones have been productive for Wyman. His meticulously detailed diaries of his years with the Stones provided the basis for his much talked about autobiography Stone Alone. His longstanding interest in photography yielded the book Chagall's World, which features Wyman's photographs of artist Marc Chagall. Additionally, he's branched out overseeing the three British locations of Sticky Figers, which won the "Best Burger in London" by both The Daily Mail and The Evenig Standard. Wyman is currently working on no less than three books, including a sequel to Stone Alone.

But of all Wyman's endeavors, it's the Rythm Kings that he cites as being the most fulfilling. "In the past, whenever I'd do solo records or movie scores or whatever, I was always doing it in my time off form the Stones, so I could never concentrate a hundred percent on any project, with this project, I spent a year or so just cutting tracks and making music for the love of it. It's a totally different attitude for me, a totally different way of looking at music. It was a lot more enjoyable this way, and I think it's some of the best work I've everd done".