Artists love to cap off their recent studio successes with live albums; think of it as a public victory lap. For Marcia Ball, this is doubly important, since Her Tallness has spent many years as the type of performer whose dynamism always seemed slightly muted off of the stage. Believe it or not, she’s never released a live album until now, and so Down The Road—released after two of her very finest albums, Presumed Innocent and So Many Rivers—exists as an anomaly: simultaneously a celebration of one of blues-rock’s finest careers, and, in a strange way, a debut.

Recorded at the Sierra Nevada Brewing Company in Chico, California, Ball nonetheless sounds right at home, bringing her unique mixture of Texas Triangle blues and swamp boogie to what appear to be the very faithful. The 14 tracks here essentially serve as a sharper-than-usual compilation of crowd favorites, from mainstays like “La Ti Da,” “That’s Enough Of That Stuff,” and “Let Me Play With Your Poodle,” to more recent triumphs like the rollicking kiss-off of “Count The Days.” Her more famous covers are here, too, from “Crawfishin’” to “Louisiana 1927,” and there’s even a guest appearance in the person of Angela Strehli, who shows up on stage to help reprise the classic “It Hurts To Be In Love.” (Lou Ann Barton, perhaps predictably, stayed at home.)

Ball is nothing if not professional, and there’s not much here you won’t have already heard at one of her shows, but if you need an introduction to her body of work, this is perfect, and you could hardly find a better performance for her to hang her live hat on, either. Marcia’s practically a natural resource at this point, able to dip and sway between zydeco, boogie, swamp-pop, soul, country, funk, and blues with equal authority. Down The Road may not be revelatory, unless you want to know the story behind a song like “Louella,” that is. But it’s damn sure a necessary document.