MUSIC: DECEMBER
CDS WE LOVE...in which we cozy up to and share music that has struck our eardrums.
(The streams below will be available until early January, when a new batch will appear.)
Roosevelt Sykes: HARD DRIVIN’ BLUES
(Delmark, 1995)
Nobody sings the blues like Roosevelt Sykes (of Elmar, Arkansas). That’s because Roosevelt put a good portion of his very pleasing (and larger-than-life) personality into his songwriting; this is a guy in touch with his feelings, folks, and he has the power to make you feel them too. We’re not sure about this, but we think the name Roosevelt Sykes vaguely registers with a good number of listeners. But have you really checked him out? It’s so worth it. We hope this warm, solid, funny little Christmas tune (from Roosevelt’s great piano blues album HARD DRIVIN’ BLUES) inspires you to dip into the man’s other work.
Hear this! "Dresser Drawers" by Roosevelt Sykes
For more information, please visit Delmark Records’ website
—MAS
Larry Donn: BURNING!
(Killer Possum Productions, 2006)
As you might be able to tell from this article (link here), we are fans of the unknown rockabilly superstar known as Larry Donn. On the OA ARKANSAS MASTERS CD, we featured a hot track from Larry Donn’s vintage days (1963) called “I’ll Never Forget You.” Here’s a hot track from a 2006 CD of Larry Donn’s called BURNING! This is a very good CD, with only one or two clunkers (hell, all great artists serve up the occasional clunkers). Most of the songs are really fun and directly tap into the fiery spirit of true-grit rockabilly. To get an autographed copy of this fine CD from Mr. Larry himself, please send a check for $15 to Mr. Larry Donn at Box 113, Bono, Arkansas, 72416. Your $15 includes the postage, so it’s a great deal. Please include your address. Highly recommended. Happy Christmas!
Hear this! "Burning in My Heart" by Larry Donn
For more information, please visit Larry Donn's MySpace page
—MAS
Various Artists: FIRE IN MY BONES: RAW + RARE + OTHERWORDLY AFRICAN AMERICAN GOSPEL [1944–2007]
(Tompkins Square, 2009)
In RESPECT YOURSELF: THE STAX RECORDS STORY, Mavis Staples proclaims, “The devil ain’t got no music—it’s all God's music.” Whether you subscribe to her religious beliefs or not, Mavis is right about one thing: Most American music, and especially the good stuff—blues, rock & roll, and soul—is rooted in black church music. When it comes to gospel, the devil’s music is God’s music and vice versa. If you’ve ever listened to The Staples Singers’ electrified pulpit, you need no further explanation from Mavis—sexuality and spirituality jointly burn like fire in her bones.
FIRE IN MY BONES, a three-CD compilation of obscure postwar gospel recordings, is to gospel what Harry Smith’s Anthology is to folk music. It collects the sometimes visceral, sometimes ghostly, freakishly beautiful sounds of people striving for musical transcendence from their storefront churches, street corners, and back-porches.
Gospel is not a style or genre of music; it is the search for eternal rhythms in 4/4 time. FIRE IN MY BONES represents the regional and historical diversity of that very attempt from the Rev. Lonnie Farris’s virtuoso sacred steel guitar, to the rough-hewed sound of Sister Ola Mae Terrell’s jack-leg blues, to the psychedelic ecstasy of the Amazing Farmers Singers’ gospel-funk. To date, this is the most exciting collection of gospel rarities I’ve heard, and has the power to convert even the most philistine of listeners.
Hear this! "I Got a Telephone in My Bosom" by The Amazing Farmer Singers of Chicago; "Fire Shed in My Bones" by Boyd Rivers; and "So Soon" by Little Ax of the Golden Echoes
For more information, please visit Tompkins Square Records’ website
—BS
The Wild Magnolias: THEY CALL US WILD
(Sunnyside Communications/Universal Music France, 2007)
What’s the best way to see if a band is any good? Give them “When the Saints Go Marching In” and see what they can do with it. The evidence in this particular case is from The Wild Magnolias’ 1973 self-titled record. That record is packaged with another gem from 1975, THEY CALL US WILD, and is now lovingly available on a double-CD set. These songs are for people who love the special bounce and energy of the purest, funkiest New Orleans music.
Hear this! "Oh! When the Saints" by The Wild Magnolias
For more information, please visit The Wild Magnolias’ website
—MAS
Betty Davis: NASTY GIRL
(reissued by Light in the Attic, 2009)
Need a good kick in the pants? Then the indomitable Betty Davis, and her full-frontal funk, is just for you. Ms. Davis seems to be channeling Eartha Kitt’s dark, funky side—and all we can say is, “Way to go, Betty.” We already declared our love for Betty Davis in an earlier OA Music Issue, but Light in the Attic Records keeps letting her out. The Washington label has now reissued four of her albums. We’re up to number three, NASTY GAL from 1975. As you can hear, it’s another beaut.
Hear this! "Funk" by Betty Davis
For more information, please visit Light in the Attic’s website
—MAS
Red Holloway: GO RED GO!
(Delmark, 2009)
Born in the blues mecca of Helena, Arkansas, in 1927, the champion smooth-cat saxist Red Holloway has enjoyed a storied career. He’s played closely with the likes of Dexter Gordon, Billie Holliday, Roosevelt Sykes, Jack McDuff, Lester Young, and the Sonnies (Rollins and Stitt). Pretty good names, eh? Red’s first solo record came out in 1963 and he’s been blowing ever since. This is a warm, subtle album.
Hear this! "Go Red Go" by Red Holloway
For more information, please visit Delmark Records’ website
—MAS
Gemma Ray: LIGHTS OUT ZOLTAR!
(Bronzerat Records, 2009)
This English beauty cultivates her own style of eerie psychedelic pop sometimes suggestive of Tilly and The Wall with upbeat, indie-rock tunes (in “100 mph”) and other times her music is very similar to that of Neko Case (in “So Do I”). The album LIGHTS OUT ZOLTAR! is a fairly mellow batch of pop-noir, with one exception: “Tough Love,” which tinkles and snaps while Gemma Ray’s voice attempts to reach Imogean Heap level octaves. Then she brings us back to her mellow groves with a duet titled “1952.” As one critic suggests, this album would make a terrific accompaniment to Uma Thurman’s heroin-induced overdose in PULP FICTION.
Hear this! "So Do I" by Gemma Ray
For more information, please visit Gemma Ray’s MySpace page
—NER
N’dambi: PINK ELEPHANT
(Concord Music Group, 2009)
N’dambi can be placed in the neo-soul category with contemporaries like Angie Stone, D’Angelo, and India Arie, but her sound is rooted in old r&b classics and soul divas like Nina Simone and Mahalia Jackson. This singer-songwriter rocks her signature afro and groovy tunes about cheating men, old and new love, and girls with big dreams.
Hear this! "Free Fallin' " by N'dambi
For more information, please visit N’dambi’s website
—NER
Big Silver: TRIBUTARY
(Max Recordings, 2009)
The latest from Little Rock’s twangy-pop group Big Silver effortlessly blends Wilco-esque arrangements with early Fab Four harmonies, making for an easy, beatific listen. Despite lyrics from the darker side of the street, the tune “Satan Cried” tells a horrific yarn a la ROSEMARY’S BABY while somehow marvelously accompanied by pop-soft “Oooo-oooo” backing vocals. “Poison the Wishing Well” is as perfectly snarling as any early-’80s Costello, complete with throbbing organ. On the whole, the album sounds neither too young or too old, with the exuberance in “Have Me Over” capturing both the whimsy of adolescence and the existential pains of growing older, while tracks like the opener “Black Suit” serve as a polished, smirking extended metaphor for aging, and moving on.
Hear this! "Have Me Over" by Big Silver
For more information, please visit Max Recordings’ website
—NE
Gossip: MUSIC FOR MEN
(Columbia, 2009)
The immediate truths: Arkansan Beth Ditto’s firebrand voice is practically unrivaled in contemporary pop—she’s got more soul than Beyoncé has in her whole family. Although Gossip have been pigeonholed as a “dance-punk” or “disco-punk” outfit, the guitar work arguably never drifts into any realm of punk thrashing that could possibly isolate the innocent pop patron, nor is the pulsing four-on-the-floor rhythm ever as synth-soaked and club-destined as whatever Britney is doing these days. If anything, Gossip push for a respectful return to pop song constructions of yore, making them vastly more accessible than pretty much anything currently residing on the Billboard Top 10.
For instance: the opener “Dimestore Diamond,” with its thunderous bass and sultry storytelling, sounds like it was left off of Heart’s DREAMBOAT ANNIE. The track “Love Long Distance” offers a Supremes-esque crescendoing love-plea, and Ditto even borrows (and alters) the immortal Motown phrase, “heard it through the bassline not much longer would you be my baby…” And “2012” metes out an infectious power-anthem like a classic Benatar hit.
Gossip practices mass-appeal pop through some alchemic appreciation of soul, classic rock, and chanteuserie, such that it defies explanation why they’re celebrated mostly abroad or by this mysterious constituency called “the gays.” Seriously, let’s get past all this long-distance, niche-genre hokum and make something very clear: Everyone in America can love Gossip, and should.
Hear this! "Love Long Distance" by Gossip
For more information, please visit Gossip’s website
—NE
Velvet Kente
(unsigned; album forthcoming in 2010)
Joshua, the frontman and primary songwriter of Velvet Kente, will not tell his age, or his last name. Nor will he discuss certain biographical details. He reveals a few fragments: he was born in Memphis. His minister-father prohibited secular music, and once, after seven-year-old Joshua refused to sing in front of the church, his father’s lashing was enough to silence him indefinitely. He didn’t sing again until nearly eight years ago, when he wrote a song for his girlfriend. He had never performed with a band until he came to Little Rock.
Velvet Kente has been together for nearly a year as a four-piece genre-dodging outfit consisting of Joshua on vocals and rhythm guitar, Steven Robinson on lead guitar, Tim Anthony (son of True Soul founder Lee Anthony) on keys, and Jamal Lee on drums. Their most obvious influences include Afro-Caribbean music, indie rock, blues mythos, and gospel. But otherwise there’s no transparent consistency in the sound—outside of Joshua’s heart-wrenched vocals, which lie somewhere between a coarse scream and a sweat-stained Pentecostal baritone.
Musicianship is a relatively new pursuit for Joshua, who clarifies that he does not consider himself a guitarist, rather that the guitar happens to be the instrument he uses to write songs. He asserts his greatest musical influence is the band’s own guitarist Steven Robinson, who, according to Joshua, “sounds like three people at once”—a blessed trinity. Though music infests Joshua’s mind, the band co-writes the songs, embellishing whatever poetic flourish the vocalist presents to them.
He describes the process of penning the song “Muddy,” a chilling ballad that borrows blues iconography Joshua claims has surrounded him all his life: “As a black American, trains and rivers don’t have a good connotation.” One day he took his guitar and sat down by the Arkansas River and began to imagine this scenario of a brutal lynching, the river having summoned some ghost of violent racism. Whether the telling is autobiographical or not, the emotional presence in the song blows a stark, cold wind against you.
Joshua admits performing with such palpable intensity is exhausting, he says, “It’s like standing naked and being fondled by a roomful of people.” And afterwards it’s as if the liturgical shame returns with a rush, and rather than mingle with the audience, he prefers to split as soon as possible, comparing it to the sobering feeling after a one-night stand: “You just want to get out of there.” Of course, this strange shyness contradicts his soul-baring. His desire for anonymity contradicts the very act of standing onstage. Perhaps Joshua’s is a self-manufactured mystique, some kind of studied rockstar sleight. But the intrigue becomes him, and serves well to offset the raw fervor of Velvet Kente’s probing, provocative music.
Hear this! "My Savior" by Velvet Kente
Velvet Kente is currently recording an album, to be released this spring. They are playing Little Rock’s White Water Tavern on December 26th.
—NE
Amanda Shires: WEST CROSS TIMBERS
(True Tone, 2009)
Contemporary country is languishing between two opposing, yet equally alarming trends—the vapid celebrity of Nashville pop and the puritanical bent of vintage-country (er, novelty acts). Amanda Shires breaks out of this stalemate with WEST CROSS TIMBERS, showcasing her mature, roots-based, pop-inflected songwriting. Unlike many who call themselves songwriters, Shires is also an accomplished musician and writes her songs with as much attention to melodic sophistication as deft lyricism.
In the opening track, “Upon Hearing Violins,” Shires navigates between syrupy pop and tough alt-country, almost as effortlessly as Neko Case herself. The honky-tonk steel guitar and plucky fiddle runs are mellowed by Shires’s breathy vocals, and all are key ingredients to her country-pop sound. But further listening proves the young beauty is noncommittal, as she demonstrates the versatility of her art. In the minimalist murder ballad “I Kept Watch Like Doves,” the uptempo basslines pulsate like the febrile rush of a violent temper while chirping birds swirl around Shires's casual vocals and her masterful illusion of innocence. “Rings and Chains” harkens back to the timeless lament of old country songs like Hank Williams’s “Cold, Cold Heart” or “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry.” On top of steel guitar licks as glacial as the heart of this seductress, Shires sings in hushed, sibilant tones and eruptive growls as she tells about the shadow-world of her past and her sexual plunders with lingering desperation and regret.
She is her own muse and, as her songs reveal, quite an unpredictable one.
Hear this! "Rings and Chains" by Amanda Shires
For more information, please visit Amanda Shires’s website
—BS
The Relatives: DON’T LET ME FALL
(Heavy Light, 2009)
It is hard to imagine songs about Jesus paired with funk, whose sounds are as unabashedly carnal as the word itself. But then you hear The Relatives and their fervor turns all perceived contradictions into a source of intrigue.
The Numero Group blew the story on the forgotten genius of gospel funk with its 2006 compilation GOOD GOD! A GOSPEL FUNK HYMNAL. Since then, record bins and studio vaults have been mined for these rare niche recordings by gospel and funk collectors alike. And Heavy Light Records dishes it out with their latest release of the ’70s-era singles of The Relatives, who were uncommonly prolific for a Dallas church band. It is no surprise, though, that popular taste and religious music would converge in Texas, the home of Don Robey’s famous Peacock label which recorded Little Richard and Memphis Slim alongside The Dixie Hummingbirds and The Five Blind Boys of Mississippi. According to The Relatives band leader the Rev. West, Don Robey tried grooming him to be a James Brown, who had himself started out in gospel, before that name had any weight.
Their varying degrees of success depended on a simple matter of crossing over, which West could have easily done, but would not even consider. Brown and West could not have taken more different career paths, but their sounds are not all that different, excepting recording quality. The LP includes dancey numbers like the prescient “Rap On,” and topical songs like “Speak to Me” and “Free at Last” of the Marvin Gaye, Curtis Mayfield ilk. And there are numbers like “This World Is Moving Too Fast” and “Walking On” as visionary as Parliament’s psychedelia and as equally extraterrestrial in their themes. Instead of giving up gospel for popular success, Rev. West and The Relatives expanded its palette, incorporating various elements of soul, funk, and even rock & roll into something new altogether.
Hear this! "Walk On" by The Relatives
For more information, please visit Heavy Light Records’ website
—BS
Mickey Stevenson: HERE I AM
(reissued by Fantastic Voyage/Future Noise, 2009)
Berry Gordy, his boss at Motown Records, called Mickey Stevenson a “superstar” who “was one of the greatest creative forces during our formative years.” But not as singer. He was Motown’s first A&R man and, as such, Stevenson wrote songs, arranged songs, nurtured talent, and who knows what else. The results speak for themselves. But Stevenson’s first love was his own singing. This 1972 solo record is all over the place and doesn’t seem to know what it wants of itself. Maybe the unnecessary soul version of “Rocky Raccoon” is emblematic of that complex. On the few performances that don’t work, Stevenson’s voice seems too casual; he’s got the chops but isn’t really exerting himself in any special way. On the performances that click, Mickey Stevenson sounds like the kind of guy you could listen to all night long.
Hear this! "Gonna Be Alright" by Mickey Stevenson
For more information, please visit Fantastic Voyage’s website
—MAS
Various Artists: 2010 CLASSIC BLUES ARTWORK CALENDAR and CD
(Blues Images)
One of our favorite multi-media efforts is Blues Images’ annual “Classic Blues Artwork” calendar, which also comes with a CD of crispy old school blues. The calendar is a pretty little thang of over-the-top advertisements for vintage 78s. Flip to the seventh month, for example, and see a blown-up ad for “The Death of Holmes’ Mule” (1929) by Charlie Turner “and His Praying Guitar.” Then: Flip to track seven on the CD and hear the song itself. See? This is fun. The CD actually comes with more songs than there are months in the year and includes previously unreleased tracks, and two moving songs by Henry Townsend. The Townsend songs come from a 78 of which only one known copy exists. Incredible!
Hear this! "Sawmill Moan" by Ramblin' Thomas
To purchase the calendar, please visit Blues Images’ website
—MAS
Jimmy Pitts: EVERYBODY SAYS THAT SAME THING
(2009)
We know people who chart the progress of Jimmy Pitts, THE OXFORD AMERICAN's former poetry editor, the way others chart tea leaves. (The world is a vast, mysterious place.) The last time we visited Mr. Pitts in this space he was fooling around with making demos of his oddly fetching and usually 100% idiosyncratic songwriting experiments. The last thing on his mind in those efforts was polished production. His focus was on stirring things up—and often he didn't even need six guitar strings (or the "right" notes) to achieve that. But Pitts is a pro now and working at Black Wings Studio in Water Valley, Mississippi, with engineer/producer Winn McElroy, he has produced not only his first radio-quality performance but his first video!
