Swamp Dogg: Total Destruction to Your Mind

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SwampDogg_TotalDestructionToYourMindLost soul classic lost no more

Industry veteran Jerry Williams, Jr. unleashed his alter ego on this 1970 masterpiece, spelling out his unconventional views in groove-heavy soul music. He makes good on the title’s brag with catchy, original songs that touch on environmental decay, social isolation, dystopian visions, racism and questions of paternity. Williams’ lyrics are often Zappa-like in their surface absurdity, but there’s a gripping observation or lament at each song’s heart. His voice has the pinched, keening sound of the Showmen’s General Norman Johnson, but with a rounded richness that suggests Jackie Wilson. Recorded at Capricorn Studios in Macon, GA, his band is soaked in the horns, low bass and guitar riffs of Southern soul, and touched by the propulsion of West Coast funk. It’s hard to imagine how this record (as well as the follow-up, Rat On!, an album better known for its cover than its content) has remained so obscure and hard to find. A two-fer on Swamp Dogg’s S.D.E.G label has been available off-and-on since 2000, but Alive’s digipack remaster should give this five-star gem the broader circulation it deserves. It’s a shame new liner notes weren’t included to provide the album’s history and context; the booklet does reproduce the song list, personnel credits, a few “relevant quotes,” and a short, typically absurd, autobiography. Analog fans will be happy to find both this and Rat On! are also being reissued on vinyl [1 2]. [©2013 Hyperbolium]

Swamp Dogg’s Home Page
A 1997 Interview with Swamp Dogg

Mary Gauthier: Live at Blue Rock

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MaryGauthier_LiveAtBlueRockMasterful live performance by country-folk singer-songwriter

Gauthier’s strength as a live performer is evident from the riveting cover of Fred Eaglesmith’s “Your Sister Cried” that opens her first live album. Taken at a resolute tempo, Gauthier is at once haggard, reportorial and sympathetic, and her hard-strummed guitar is augmented by dramatic accents, a harmony vocal and a solo from violinist Tania Elizabeth that leaves the audience hooting in appreciation. Together with percussionist Mike Meadows, the trio proves that less can very much be more, as their presentations leave enough space for the vocals, harmonies, lyrics and instruments to each shine, but combine the elements into a musculature that a solo singer-songwriter rarely achieves.

Key to the proceedings is Gauthier’s way with a lyric. Whether singing or reciting, she’s magnetic as a master storyteller who’s in no hurry. Her harmonica and Elizabeth’s violin are similarly free in their pace, allowing the solos and accompaniment to ebb and flow with the lyrical mood. The song list includes selections from all but Gauthier’s first studio album, with a generous helping of four selections from 1999’s Drag Queens and Limousines and three Fred Eaglesmith tunes. She sings of outsiders: a hobo king, an addict and an alcoholic, a disillusioned father, an unmoored adoptee and a repentant murderer. But even with their troubled backgrounds, they form a surprisingly seemly lot, humanized by Gauthier’s telling of their stories.

There are autobiographical threads throughout Gauthier’s material as she recounts the hidden history of her hometown, personal tribulations and liberations, and the colorful friends with whom she’s traveled. Her songs form a compelling memoir that she sings night after night; and though she’s been lauded for both her studio and stage work, what’s captured here is a seamless confluence of craft and performance – the solid platform of her songs upon which she layers a dramatist’s appreciation of presentation. The CD highlights a detailed snapshot in front of an appreciative audience, one that will stoke the memories of those who’ve enjoyed Gauthier’s live sets, and provide new listeners a compelling introduction to her work as a singer, songwriter and performer. [©2013 Hyperbolium]

Mary Gauthier’s Home Page

Bobby Rush: Down in Louisiana

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BobbyRush_DownInLouisianaSwamp-tinged, soul-grooved electric blues

Singer/guitarist Bobby Rush has traveled an interesting road as a musician. Born in Louisiana, his family relocated to Chicago in the early ‘50s, where Rush was schooled by Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf and other giants of the Windy City’s iconic blues scene. He developed his own sound in the ‘60s, equally fueled by blues, funk and soul, and then in 1971 he moved back to the South and made it his home base for extensive roadwork. He’s traveled the remnants of the chitlin’ circuit, played nightclubs, auditoriums and Las Vegas showrooms, and at the age of 77 remains terrifically vital as a singer, songwriter, guitarist and harmonica player. His latest album blends electric blues with the soul of his native Louisiana, rendered by a stripped-down quintet of guitar, keyboards, harmonica, bass and drums. The results range from twelve bar blues to swamp-funk to the ‘70s styled groove “Rock This House.” Rush and co-producer/keyboardist Paul Brown add a few contemporary touches to the vocals, but the music never strays far from the sounds that are deeply rooted in Rush’s musical soul. [©2013 Hyperbolium]

The Best Little Record Store You Ever Saw… is Back!

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The Original Rather Ripped

Rather Ripped Records was a legendary shop on the north side of the U.C. Berkeley campus. It was archtypical in its tasteful selection of music, knowledgeable staff and its gravity as a gathering place. It’s list of accomplishments – concerts hosted, bands launched – pales in comparison to the far-reaching impact it had on its customers. Ask anyone who shopped there regularly, and they’ll tell you about the records that a staff member pulled out from below the counter and handed over with a “I thought you might like this” recommendation. Records that more often than not became favorites and opened up entire new vistas of music. Rather Ripped wasn’t just a place to buy records, it was a place to hang out and indulge with like-minded fiends. The original shop closed in the early-80s and moved to a warehouse in Oakland, but it never had the lively vibe of the location right across the street from the University. The name lived on as a mail-order business, but there was no more dropping by or hanging out.

But Rather Ripped has now returned – to founder Russ Ketter’s home town of Pittsburgh, PA. The new RRR is located at 4314 Butler Steet in the suburb of Lawrenceville, and it’s well-stocked with vinyl, CDs, posters and collectibles. But what a store like this really needs is patrons – customers who hang out, talk music and add to the critical mass that makes a record shop more than a retail outlet. Check out their website (below), and if you’re in the Pittsburgh area, make sure to drop in, they’re currently open Thursday-Monday 11am-7pm!

Rather Ripped Records’ Home Page

On Tour: Michael Nesmith

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Michael Nesmith (Monkees, First National Band) embarks upon his first solo tour in over twenty years, starting in Nashville and visiting major metropolitan areas around the U.S. He’s featuring songs from across his fifty years of songwriting, focusing primarily on the post-Monkees solo years (though he’s also opening his set with “Papa Gene’s Blues”). In addition to material from the First National Band, he’s featuring songs from And the Hits Just Keep On Coming, Photon Wing and Infinite Rider, Elephant Parts, Tropical Campfires, The Prison and Rays!

Thurs., March 21  FRANKLIN, TN  Franklin Theater – SOLD OUT
Sun., March 24 AGOURA HILLS, CA Canyon Club
Tues., March 26 SANTA CRUZ, CA  Rio Theater
Wed., March 27 SAN FRANCISCO, CA  Palace of Fine Arts
Fri., March 29  PORTLAND, OR   Aladdin Theater
Sat., March 30  SEATTLE, WA  Neptune Theater
Wed., April 3  BOULDER, CO  Boulder Theater
Fri., April 5  ST. PAUL, MN  Fitzgerald Theater
Sat., April 6  CHICAGO, IL  Old Town School of Folk Music – SOLD OUT
Sun., April 7  FERNDALE, MI  The Magic Bag – SOLD OUT
Tues., April 9  MUNHALL, PA  Carnegie Music Hall of Holmstead
Thurs., April 11  NORTHAMPTON, MA  Iron Horse – SOLD OUT
Fri., April 12  RAHWAY, NJ  Union County Performing Arts Center
Sat., April 13  SOMERVILLE, MA  Somerville Theater
Mon., April 15  PHILADELPHIA, PA  World Café Live – SOLD OUT
Tues., April 16  NEW YORK, NY  Town Hall
Wed., April 17  WASHINGTON, DC  Birchmere

Merle Haggard: The Complete ‘60s Capitol Singles

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MerleHaggard_TheComplete60sCapitolSinglesHaggard’s original 1960s Capitol singles – A’s and B’s

As with their collections of singles on Wanda Jackson and George Jones, Ominvore’s anthology of twenty-eight Merle Haggard sides – fourteen A’s and their respective B’s – shows off a perspective not covered by greatest hits collections or original album reissues. In addition to Haggard’s thirteen charting 1960s Capitol A-sides (eight of which topped the charts), the set includes the non-charting “Shade Tree Fix-it-Man.” Haggard wrote all but one of the A-sides (“The Fugitive,” penned by Liz Anderson), and most of the flips, but his first Capitol single was backed by a lush-stringed arrangement of Ralph Mooney’s “Falling for You,” and he later covered Anderson’s sorrowful “This Town’s Not Big Enough.”

Haggard’s B-sides are far from the filler many producers used to force DJ’s onto the plug side; the productions were carefully crafted, and the instrumental backings are often highlighted by Ralph Mooney’s piercing steel and Roy Nichols’ sharply picked electric and resophonic guitars. It’s hard to imagine how DJs kept themselves from flipping “The Legend of Bonnie and Clyde” to play the equally attractive “I Started Loving You Again.” There are a few lighter sides, like “The Girl Turned Ripe,” but the lyrics are most often of afflicted love – relationships bound to end, ending, or receding too slowly in the rear view mirror. Haggard’s jazzier inclinations come out on Hank Cochran’s “Loneliness is Eating Me Alive” and the original “Good Times,” and his love of Jimmie Rodgers is heard in a cover of “California Blues.”

The collection includes singles that are among Haggard’s best and most loved recordings, commencing (with “Swinging Doors”) a run of top-charting singles that ran for nearly twenty-five years. All twenty-eight sides are remastered from the original singles mixes, and in mono for everything but 1969’s “Okie From Muskogee” and it’s flip “If I Had Left it Up to You.” The sound is crisp and leaps from the speakers, and the sixteen-page booklet includes session and release data, photos, ephemera and new liner notes by ace guitarist Deke Dickerson. Those looking for a broader recitation of Haggard’s career should seek out the 4-CD Down Every Road, Bear Family’s box sets [1 2 3 4], or the numerous reissues of his original album (including many two-fers of his Capitol work); but for a great listen to his initial run as a hit-maker, this set is a first-class ticket. [©2013 Hyperbolium]

Merle Haggard’s Home Page

The Box Tops: Playlist – The Very Best Of

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BoxTops_PlaylistTheVeryBestOfStirring set of Memphis pop-soul singles in glorious mono

Fans of the Box Tops’ Memphis-tinged radio pop, whether period AM listeners or working their way backwards from Big Star or Alex Chilton’s solo work, will find something interesting here. The band’s ten charting singles (from 1967’s chart-topping debut, “The Letter,” through the non-LP “Turn on a Dream” and “You Keep Tightening Up on Me”) are supplemented by four B-sides, all in their original gut-punching mono. The B’s include the first Alex Chilton track released on a single, “I See Only Sunshine,” as well as “Together,” his B-side to “Turn on a Dream.” Though the group’s original albums provide a deeper experience, stringing together the hit singles and a few B-sides closely replicates how the band was heard by record buyers at the time. It’s a compelling introduction to Alex Chilton’s soul-soaked vocals and the terrific production of Dan Penn, Chips Moman and Tommy Cogbill. It’d be great if someone released a complete singles collection, adding the missing B-sides and the group’s later sides for Bell, Hi and Stax, but at fourteen tracks the set provides some lesser-heard B-sides without losing the focus on the group’s hits. Best of all, the mono mixes deliver an original sound that really distinguish this set from the longer Best of the Box Tops. [©2013 Hyperbolium]

The Box Tops’ Home Page

Wanda Jackson: The Best of the Classic Capitol Singles

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WandaJackson_BestOfTheClassicCapitolSingles

Recent collections of singles from Roy Orbison, Carl Perkins, Ray Charles and others have shed new light on much-loved performers. In addition to well-known hits, these anthologies highlight the valiant misses and B-sides that faded from an artist’s repertoire as their catalog was reduced to greatest hits collections. Wanda Jackson’s rockabilly and country recordings have been well-served in reissue, with both original albums and anthologies in print, but Omnivore’s 29-track collection provides an expanded view of her career as a singles artist. In addition to her well-loved A-sides “Hot Dog! That Made Him Made,” “Cool Love,” “Fujiyama Mama,” “Honey Bop,” “Mean Mean Man,” “Rock Your Baby,” “Let’s Have a Party,” “Riot in Cell Block Number Nine,” “Right or Wrong,” and “In the Middle of a Heartache,” the set is stocked with ace chart-misses and B-sides.

As early as 1956 Jackson was backing up her incendiary rockabilly singles with country flips that included “Half a Good a Girl” and the maiden recording of Jack Rhodes and Dick Reynolds’ “Silver Threads and Golden Needles.” She added a rockabilly croon to the Cadillacs’ bluesy doo-wop B-side “Let Me Explain” and shined brightly on Boudleaux Bryant’s calypso novelty “Don’a Wan’a.” Her ballads were often backed by Jordanaires-styled male harmonies and hard-twanging guitars (courtesy of A-list players Joe Maphis and Buck Owens) that keep her rock ‘n’ roll roots simmering. Even more straightforward country weepers like “No Wedding Bells for Joe” and “Sinful Heart” have downbeats that are more insistent than their Nashville contemporaries.

Jackson’s original “Little Charm Bracelet” didn’t make the charts, but it’s a cleverly written story of a relationship’s hopeful start and interrupted ending. Fans may be surprised to find that the favorite “Funnel of Love” was actually a B-side (to the country hit “Right or Wrong”), as the release signaled the beginnings of Jackson’s transition to the country charts. Still, even as the A-sides turned country, the B-sides held onto their sass with originals “I’d Be Ashamed” and “You Bug Me Bad,” and a bouncy version of Bobby Bare’s “Sympathy.” The productions are split between Los Angeles (tracks 1-17) and Nashville (tracks 18-29), and while the latter show countrypolitan touches, several of Jackson’s hottest rock ‘n’ roll records were recorded with Roy Clark and other Music City luminaries.

Jackson’s still recording vital new works today, including a 2012 release produced by Justin Townes Earle. There have also been anthologies of her rockabilly sides, best-ofs [1 2], album reissues [1 2 3 4], and box sets that tell the complete story from 1954 through 1973 [1 2]. Every one of these sets has something to offer, as does Omnivore’s look at Jackson’s singles from her rockabilly and initial country years. This isn’t a complete retelling, as its missing non-LP singles and leaves the last decade of her run on Capitol unexplored, but what’s here, all in superbly crafted mono, is terrific. The A-sides are well-known but not worn-out, the B-sides rare treasures, and the 16-page booklet includes fresh liner notes from Daniel Cooper, session and release data, photos and ephemera. [©2013 Hyperbolium]

Wanda Jackson’s Home Page

Chris Stamey: Lovesick Blues

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ChrisStamey_LovesickBluesA pensive set from a legendary singer-songwriter

It’s been nine years since Chris Stamey’s last solo album, Travels in the South. In the interim he’s worked with Yo La Tengo on A Question of Temperature., re-teamed with fellow dB Peter Holsapple for Here and Now, regrouped with the dB’s for Falling Off the Sky, and continued a busy career as a recording engineer and record producer. The long years between solo outings are certainly understandable, if not necessarily a happy state of affairs for fans; but those same fans should feel rewarded by this collection of eleven magnificent new productions. Stamey’s melancholy tunefulness has never sounded more graceful, rendered in contemplative tones and finely crafted instrumental textures that shift seamlessly between rock, soul, jazz and classical.

Stamey’s formal education in music theory and composition has never been a secret, but his recent work on the Big Star Third concerts seems to have deepened his thinking about how orchestral instruments could fit into and augment his music. He interleaves strings, woodwinds and brass with guitars, bass and drums, dotting his musical landscape with cello, bassoon, flute and trombone. The results are both ethereal and dynamic, offering everything from neo-psych dreaminess to symphonic vigor, sometimes within the same song, as on the sky-gazing “Astronomy.” This coalescing of musical influences is seemingly foreshadowed by the merging of souls in the opener, “Skin.”

At 59, Stamey’s long since expanded upon the punchy guitar rock with which the dB’s introduced themselves, though “You n Me n XTC” has a chorus hook that will make listeners think back. The album plays as late-night ruminations on metaphysical wanderings, philosophical wonderings and haggard day-end inventories. Stamey sings with a thoughtful absorption that suggests Paul Simon’s folk songs, and the self-referential “I Wrote This Song for You” has the charm of an Alex Chilton love song. Stamey’s lyrics remain poetic, but his vocabulary and singing have softened from their earlier percussiveness – a change that fits these pensive songs. [©2013 Hyperbolium]

Chris Stamey’s Home Page