I used to work at a vintage guitar store, and I learned to be able to tell the difference between American made guitars and their Japanese and Chinese knock-offs. Sure the contours were the same, and the lacquer looked pretty similar, but there is something about a Gibson that sounds and feels very different from an Epiphone. The Pogues prove that music is the same way. They’re the kind of band whose roots show in everything they do. Not because they sing about their home, or because they use traditional Irish instrumentation, but because the emotion their music portrays sounds like the world they came out of.
In 1985 Ireland was almost twenty years deep into the Troubles. Constant protest and upheaval had made northern Ireland a battleground, and the whole country was suffering. The Pogues released Rum, Sodomy And the Lash amid this confusion and devastation, as an honest portrayal of how it felt to be in the Irish working class during all this. You can hear it in songs like “The Old Main Drag”, the story of a young man living on the street after moving to a cruel city, or it’s counterpart “Sally Maclennane”, which is about the people who stay at home. “Dirty Old Town” is about growing up and then dying in the same town, and the closeness between nostalgia and regret.
For the most part, the songs on Rum, Sodomy And The Lash can be divided into two categories, songs about home and songs about war. What could be more appropriate knowing Ireland’s political situation? Up-tempo romps like “Gentleman Soldier” or “Billy’s Bones” try to make horrible situations easier, by using humor, but by the last song all of the pleasantries are gone. “The Band Played Waltzing Matilda”, originally by Eric Bogle, starts with just a banjo and Shane McGowan’s despondent vocals. You begin to piece together the story of a young carefree man who’s drafted into the Australian army to fight in the Battle Of Gallipoli. After weeks in the trenches he’s hit by a Turkish shell and loses his legs. It’s not just a physical wound, however, his whole outlook is changed:
As our ship pulled into circular quay,
I looked at the place where my legs used to be,
And thanked Christ there was nobody waiting for me,
To grieve and to mourn and to pity.
Time passes and the last image we have of him is as an old man, sitting on his porch watching the ANZAC parades:
I see the old men, all twisted and torn,
The forgotten heroes of a forgotten war,
And the young people ask me what are they marching for,
And I ask myself the same question
While Eric Bogle wrote the song to be about the veterans of the First World War, the Pogues have made it distinctly Irish. It’s impossible to hear this song without thinking of the Troubles, and the people who lived through them. So critics will say the lacquer is faded or the contours are off, but you can’t argue that this album isn’t authentic.
Friday, August 28, 2009
One Day As A Lion
Zack De la Rocha and Jon Theodore have made an album that’s so good it hurts. In fact let me rephrase that. They’ve made an album that’s good enough to hurt. You can feel the pain and anger in every note, every sound, every breath.
Sonically, One Day As A Lion is not a departure from Theodore or De La Rocha’s previous projects. Theodore’s drums could just as well fit into a later Mars Volta album and Zach De La Rocha sounds like he could still be singing for Rage Against the Machine. This is not a criticism, but rather a compliment. It’s an incredible feat that 8 years after Rage Against the Machine, Zack De La Rocha is still has the gift of being brutally truthful and genuinely angry. Theodore has managed to stay fresh conceptually and, if anything, has cultivated the driving energy of his earlier work. One factor that is brand new is De La Rocha’s synth playing. His long, sustained, distorted tones compliment his vocals perfectly, giving the record a foundation that makes Theodore’s syncopation and odd time signatures possible.
You’d think that One Day As A Lion would sound empty being only a two-piece and you’d be right. Not empty in the sense that it’s lacking anything, but empty in a way that feels desolate and bare. Like the veneer has been ripped off and all that’s left is the scarred and rotten wood underneath. The first three tracks of this EP sound like this. Like it’s all hopeless, they tell us the world is fucked and this is why. But In the last two tracks there’s a subtle change. They still don’t offer a path to reconciliation but they point at a method that could help. In “If You Fear Dying” Zack De La Rocha tells, or maybe threatens, us not to be afraid:
“Time is coming,
Rising like the dawn of a red sun,
If you fear dying then you’re already dead.”
This is a distinct departure, from the beginning of the record. He’s not letting us know what’s wrong he telling us we’ve got a part in it.
That’s why this album hurts. The first three tracks you simply agree with what De La Rocha is saying, basically that there are problems with our country and our system. However, by the fourth you understand that whatever you feel is wrong with this country isn’t just a condition, it’s a result of what we’re doing, and no one is innocent. So what can we do? Well, It’s written there in big block letters across the album cover, but in case you missed that it’s also one of the last lines on the record. “One Day, I say today, we live as a lion.”
Sonically, One Day As A Lion is not a departure from Theodore or De La Rocha’s previous projects. Theodore’s drums could just as well fit into a later Mars Volta album and Zach De La Rocha sounds like he could still be singing for Rage Against the Machine. This is not a criticism, but rather a compliment. It’s an incredible feat that 8 years after Rage Against the Machine, Zack De La Rocha is still has the gift of being brutally truthful and genuinely angry. Theodore has managed to stay fresh conceptually and, if anything, has cultivated the driving energy of his earlier work. One factor that is brand new is De La Rocha’s synth playing. His long, sustained, distorted tones compliment his vocals perfectly, giving the record a foundation that makes Theodore’s syncopation and odd time signatures possible.
You’d think that One Day As A Lion would sound empty being only a two-piece and you’d be right. Not empty in the sense that it’s lacking anything, but empty in a way that feels desolate and bare. Like the veneer has been ripped off and all that’s left is the scarred and rotten wood underneath. The first three tracks of this EP sound like this. Like it’s all hopeless, they tell us the world is fucked and this is why. But In the last two tracks there’s a subtle change. They still don’t offer a path to reconciliation but they point at a method that could help. In “If You Fear Dying” Zack De La Rocha tells, or maybe threatens, us not to be afraid:
“Time is coming,
Rising like the dawn of a red sun,
If you fear dying then you’re already dead.”
This is a distinct departure, from the beginning of the record. He’s not letting us know what’s wrong he telling us we’ve got a part in it.
That’s why this album hurts. The first three tracks you simply agree with what De La Rocha is saying, basically that there are problems with our country and our system. However, by the fourth you understand that whatever you feel is wrong with this country isn’t just a condition, it’s a result of what we’re doing, and no one is innocent. So what can we do? Well, It’s written there in big block letters across the album cover, but in case you missed that it’s also one of the last lines on the record. “One Day, I say today, we live as a lion.”
Gallo Del Cielo
A couple years ago I saw Joe Ely play at a tiny little club called “The Turning Point” in the town I grew up in. The Turning Point is hardly even a venue, more like three or four closets held together with Scotch tape. I went out to see him mostly as a tribute, figuring he’d be like Bobby “Blue” Bland or Les Paul, great players and great presences, but shadows of what they used to be. He’s played literally thousands of shows since he started touring in 1963 and to much bigger crowds than he could expect (or fit) in my little town. But he came down the steps (no backstage), hopped up under the lights, and played a show that was truly impressive.
By the time he got to my little town Joe Ely he had been playing about a hundred shows a year for 30 years. He’d toured the entire continental United States and most of Europe, with everyone from John Prine to The Clash. He’d released 17 albums under his own name and many more with the other bands he’d been in. Even after all of this Ely has never had what you could call mainstream success. Indifferent record labels are mostly to blame for this, not releasing some records, and hardly promoting the majority of them. But despite, or maybe because of this, Ely’s performances have gotten better and better. Every second of the night is a full commitment, a truly heartfelt statement, whether he’s playing his own songs or one of the many covers he’s refined over the years.
The strongest of these covers is a song called “Gallo Del Cielo” originally written by Tom Russell, another unrecognized performer, in the same school as Ely. It’s is a song about a man named Carlos Saragosa who steals a rooster named Gallo del Cielo to bet money on him in cockfights. He wagers his sisters locket, the only thing he has of any value, trying desperately to muster up the money to buy back the land stolen from his father. Saragosa travels from town to town, bidding every penny he has again and again on the strength of the rooster. Eventually his luck runs out as the rooster’s beak breaks and Gallo Del Cielo falls in the dust, dead. Saragosa is crushed, and winds up a broken, defeated man.
It’s a tough song, a real heartbreaking story of faith meeting reality and after the show was over I couldn’t stop thinking about it. The song is meant to be about Saragosa, his struggle and his defeat, but when Ely sings it you can tell that he’s not relating the protagonist. How could he relate to someone who is crushed after only one defeat? No, Ely isn’t Saragosa. He’s the rooster, Gallo Del Cielo. You won’t see him giving up, he’ll fight until he no longer can, and whether it’s his heart that gives out or his fingers, it sure as hell won’t be his spirit.
By the time he got to my little town Joe Ely he had been playing about a hundred shows a year for 30 years. He’d toured the entire continental United States and most of Europe, with everyone from John Prine to The Clash. He’d released 17 albums under his own name and many more with the other bands he’d been in. Even after all of this Ely has never had what you could call mainstream success. Indifferent record labels are mostly to blame for this, not releasing some records, and hardly promoting the majority of them. But despite, or maybe because of this, Ely’s performances have gotten better and better. Every second of the night is a full commitment, a truly heartfelt statement, whether he’s playing his own songs or one of the many covers he’s refined over the years.
The strongest of these covers is a song called “Gallo Del Cielo” originally written by Tom Russell, another unrecognized performer, in the same school as Ely. It’s is a song about a man named Carlos Saragosa who steals a rooster named Gallo del Cielo to bet money on him in cockfights. He wagers his sisters locket, the only thing he has of any value, trying desperately to muster up the money to buy back the land stolen from his father. Saragosa travels from town to town, bidding every penny he has again and again on the strength of the rooster. Eventually his luck runs out as the rooster’s beak breaks and Gallo Del Cielo falls in the dust, dead. Saragosa is crushed, and winds up a broken, defeated man.
It’s a tough song, a real heartbreaking story of faith meeting reality and after the show was over I couldn’t stop thinking about it. The song is meant to be about Saragosa, his struggle and his defeat, but when Ely sings it you can tell that he’s not relating the protagonist. How could he relate to someone who is crushed after only one defeat? No, Ely isn’t Saragosa. He’s the rooster, Gallo Del Cielo. You won’t see him giving up, he’ll fight until he no longer can, and whether it’s his heart that gives out or his fingers, it sure as hell won’t be his spirit.
Jerry Williams: Gone
It’s funny how much an album cover matters. In the world of the digital download, the cover of an old LP found at a junk store can make an enormous impact. I stumbled across a record like this a couple years ago, a gorgeous Pedro Bell style album cover with a giant purple hand on the front with a spider’s face replacing the middle finger and doodles of everything from helicopters to rhinoceroses on the back. I dug deep into my pockets and coughed up the 50 cents that the storeowner was asking and promptly dumped the LP in one of the many milk crates that litter my apartment.
Months later organizing my records (It’s not habit-forming, I promise, I can quit anytime I want.) I found that same record and put it on the platter for the same reason that I bought it. Bracing myself for disappointment, I watched robot arm of the needle hit the wax and was immediately captivated. Tighter than tight drums punch in a funky groove and a bass that could only be played by Ed Watkins sounds so purposeful it’s hard to listen to anything else. And those horns. Those fucking horns come in like Memphis in 1965. Meanwhile, the singer sounds like Stevie Wonder would have if the eighties had never hit, he’s got all that controlled openness and generosity of emotion that so many people try and fail to imitate.
Turns out the record is called Gone and it’s by a guy named Jerry Williams. A quick background search shows that Williams had been playing for a long time before Gone came out. At the tender age of sixteen He began his career by playing rhythm guitar for Little Richard, where the lead guitar player, one Jimmy James (who would soon change his last name to Hendrix) served as a mentor and advisor. After the authorities found out about his age Williams was forced to leave the Little Richard tour and found his own band, the Top Beats. When the Top Beats were less than successful and a solo record failed, Williams spent a few years working at a dairy farm. It would be almost half a decade before he tried again.
In 1979 he released Gone and it is aptly named. Serious disagreements with Warner Brothers immediately after its release meant that it would never be as widely accepted as Williams had hoped. Today Gone is virtually unknown. Even so, one glance at the credits and it’s obvious that the cuts were made in the promotion, not the production. The liner notes could serve as a who’s who of late seventies session musicians, not to mention the historic figures. It’s the only album that both of the great pioneers of electric bass, James Jamerson and Donald “Duck” Dunn, appear on together. But even with all of these big names, Gone still sounds like one voice. There’s a continuity that flows between all of the songs, even the ones not penned by Williams himself. It’s about as close to perfect as you can get and still have enough flaws to be human.
Records like this one are what make those milk crates in my apartment important. That urge to search junk stores can’t be just a twisted obsession if discoveries like Gone can come from it. And I can honestly say that just this once, I’m glad that I judged a book by its cover.
Months later organizing my records (It’s not habit-forming, I promise, I can quit anytime I want.) I found that same record and put it on the platter for the same reason that I bought it. Bracing myself for disappointment, I watched robot arm of the needle hit the wax and was immediately captivated. Tighter than tight drums punch in a funky groove and a bass that could only be played by Ed Watkins sounds so purposeful it’s hard to listen to anything else. And those horns. Those fucking horns come in like Memphis in 1965. Meanwhile, the singer sounds like Stevie Wonder would have if the eighties had never hit, he’s got all that controlled openness and generosity of emotion that so many people try and fail to imitate.
Turns out the record is called Gone and it’s by a guy named Jerry Williams. A quick background search shows that Williams had been playing for a long time before Gone came out. At the tender age of sixteen He began his career by playing rhythm guitar for Little Richard, where the lead guitar player, one Jimmy James (who would soon change his last name to Hendrix) served as a mentor and advisor. After the authorities found out about his age Williams was forced to leave the Little Richard tour and found his own band, the Top Beats. When the Top Beats were less than successful and a solo record failed, Williams spent a few years working at a dairy farm. It would be almost half a decade before he tried again.
In 1979 he released Gone and it is aptly named. Serious disagreements with Warner Brothers immediately after its release meant that it would never be as widely accepted as Williams had hoped. Today Gone is virtually unknown. Even so, one glance at the credits and it’s obvious that the cuts were made in the promotion, not the production. The liner notes could serve as a who’s who of late seventies session musicians, not to mention the historic figures. It’s the only album that both of the great pioneers of electric bass, James Jamerson and Donald “Duck” Dunn, appear on together. But even with all of these big names, Gone still sounds like one voice. There’s a continuity that flows between all of the songs, even the ones not penned by Williams himself. It’s about as close to perfect as you can get and still have enough flaws to be human.
Records like this one are what make those milk crates in my apartment important. That urge to search junk stores can’t be just a twisted obsession if discoveries like Gone can come from it. And I can honestly say that just this once, I’m glad that I judged a book by its cover.
More Hope for Rock and Roll
About twice a year someone says that there’s a new band that’s gonna save Rock and Roll. Some trendsetter decides that leather jackets and guitars are cool again, and critics old and young praise them for “saving” Rock, like it’s some feeble old man on his deathbed. Well, The Gaslight Anthem has given us proof that Rock and Roll doesn’t need any saving, it’s alive and well and it’s living in central Jersey.
The Gaslight Anthem emerged out of the New Brunswick, New Jersey hardcore scene in 2005 with their first album Sink Or Swim, an unpolished highly energetic LP that laid the groundwork for their future material. In between the dates of their daunting tour schedule they wrote and recorded their second album, an EP called Senor and the Queen, which was considerably stronger and more focused than their first attempt. The ’59 Sound continues to build on the formula of their previous efforts, finally showing what the Gaslight Anthem is really capable of.
This album is not a technical masterpiece. Pat Metheny fans should probably stop reading this review right about now. No single musician stands out as a virtuoso, and very similar chord patterns are used in almost every song. What’s great about this album is that it sounds like a real band recorded it. Brain Fallon’s voice is comfortable and confident while still sounding urgent, and his band supports him without stepping on his toes. In every track you can hear endless hours of basement practices and months upon months of touring.
The ‘59 Sound is full of images. Each song paints a picture of the social and physical landscape that it came out of. Diners and Ferris Wheels populate a landscape entirely constructed of beaches and highways. The characters aren’t glamorous, but they’re immediately recognizable. Who doesn’t know someone Sandy and Johnny in “Even Cowgirls Get the Blues”, a couple who grew up and lost their exuberance? Or Anna in “Here’s Looking At you, Kid” the girl who moved out of a small town and lost herself in the city? The characters and places in this album are what make it genuine, like it came to life by itself and this album is merely a record of it.
The masterpiece on this album is the very last song “The Backseat”, a gut-wrenching tribute to the pain of adolescence. In every line you can hear the frustration of someone who doesn’t know where he’s going, how he’s getting there, or why he’s even trying. It’s a battle cry for the confused and vulnerable. Anyone who has ever been a teenager knows what Fallon means when he sings, “In the back seat we just tried to find some room for our knees/In the backseat we just tried to find some room to breathe”.
So thanks a lot but Rock and Roll doesn’t need any help. You can keep your sunglasses and you can keep your prop guitars. You can keep your savior, as long as we’ve got The Gaslight Anthem.
The Gaslight Anthem emerged out of the New Brunswick, New Jersey hardcore scene in 2005 with their first album Sink Or Swim, an unpolished highly energetic LP that laid the groundwork for their future material. In between the dates of their daunting tour schedule they wrote and recorded their second album, an EP called Senor and the Queen, which was considerably stronger and more focused than their first attempt. The ’59 Sound continues to build on the formula of their previous efforts, finally showing what the Gaslight Anthem is really capable of.
This album is not a technical masterpiece. Pat Metheny fans should probably stop reading this review right about now. No single musician stands out as a virtuoso, and very similar chord patterns are used in almost every song. What’s great about this album is that it sounds like a real band recorded it. Brain Fallon’s voice is comfortable and confident while still sounding urgent, and his band supports him without stepping on his toes. In every track you can hear endless hours of basement practices and months upon months of touring.
The ‘59 Sound is full of images. Each song paints a picture of the social and physical landscape that it came out of. Diners and Ferris Wheels populate a landscape entirely constructed of beaches and highways. The characters aren’t glamorous, but they’re immediately recognizable. Who doesn’t know someone Sandy and Johnny in “Even Cowgirls Get the Blues”, a couple who grew up and lost their exuberance? Or Anna in “Here’s Looking At you, Kid” the girl who moved out of a small town and lost herself in the city? The characters and places in this album are what make it genuine, like it came to life by itself and this album is merely a record of it.
The masterpiece on this album is the very last song “The Backseat”, a gut-wrenching tribute to the pain of adolescence. In every line you can hear the frustration of someone who doesn’t know where he’s going, how he’s getting there, or why he’s even trying. It’s a battle cry for the confused and vulnerable. Anyone who has ever been a teenager knows what Fallon means when he sings, “In the back seat we just tried to find some room for our knees/In the backseat we just tried to find some room to breathe”.
So thanks a lot but Rock and Roll doesn’t need any help. You can keep your sunglasses and you can keep your prop guitars. You can keep your savior, as long as we’ve got The Gaslight Anthem.
There Ain't Much To Country Living: The Drive By Truckers And The Fine Print
A few years ago I heard about a band that was doing a kind of updated country-rock thing and went to seem them play Irving Plaza. They played for about an hour and half, dazzling what would otherwise have been a jaded New York crowd with their proud, aggressive songs and the brutal realism of their lyrics. After the last chord was struck and the world started spinning again I went over to their merch booth to pick up as many of their records as I could fit in my pockets.
The Drive-By Truckers have been touring and recording for about thirteen years. They’ve put out seven studio albums and a couple live sides, gently modifying their sound with each new release while staying true to the gritty subject matter they’ve chosen to depict. But no matter how much they tweak the arrangements they never give up the three guitars that decorate these records. The counter melodies these guitars contribute ebb and flow from left to right, supporting and complimenting the vocal part while never getting in its way. The rhythm section is equally restrained. They tend to choose just what’s right for the song whether they’re playing one of their famous “molasses in an igloo” dirges or an up tempo country punk rocker.
At the beginning of next month they release a collection of outtakes and previously unreleased material called The Fine Print. Most people tend to be skeptical of records like this because the songs on these musical grab bags weren’t released for a reason. However, the tracks that grace this compilation are the kind that most artists would build an album around. It’s hard to imagine why a tune like “When The Well Runs Dry” would ever hit the cutting room floor. This bleak portrayal of the people who we leave behind is exquisitely painful and is made even more so by the foundation laid by a churning, vibrato soaked organ. It’s a song that makes it mighty difficult to avoid hitting the repeat button.
This record also showcases Patterson Hood’s talent as an interpreter of other people’s material. It’s the first time they’ve released any covers on a full album and each one is better than the last. Like his take on Tom Petty’s “Rebels”. It’s full of that mix of tragic southern pride and bittersweet recklessness which has been such a landmark in Hood’s emotional range. Or there’s his interpretation of Warron Zevon’s “Play It All Night Long” which talks about the low points of country life. In this tune they make a bold statement by contradicting Lynyrd Skynyrd. After three verses of visceral descriptions of the shame and agony which is ever present in poor southern life Hood growls Zevon’s words as if they were written just for him:
There Ain’t much to country Livin’,
Sweat, Piss, Jizz, Blood,
Sweet Home Alabama play that dead man’s song,
Turn them speakers up full blast,
Play it all Night long.
Also present on the album is a version of “Like a Rolling Stone” and a heartbreaking Tom. T. Hall story-song about a Vietnam vet coming home in a wheelchair called “Mama Bake a Pie”. Hood not only makes each song his own, but molds them to fit into the vision DBT follows.
The most convincing reason as to why The Drive-By Truckers, and more specifically this record, are special; is their fearlessness towards paradox. Songs on this collection have a tendency to tell both sides of the story, often all but directly contradicting each other. Like on the third and fourth tracks where Mike Cooley talks about Wilson Dam flooding the holler where a man spent his life. The loss of his home and the way he grew accustomed to living eventually drives him to suicide. The very next track is Jason Isbell thanking the Tennessee Valley Authority (The organization which built the dam) for giving his family opportunities they otherwise wouldn’t have had. Both songwriters make each argument sound so convincing that it’s hard to know who to believe.
It’s not that they aren’t making a clear statement. Hood, Cooley, and Isbell are full of strong, often subversive, positions not just on the south but on life in general. It just so happens that these perspectives don’t always agree with each other. As the last chord rings and the world starts spinning again, you end up thinking about the problem in a way that makes a lot less sense, and so ultimately is a lot more realistic.
The Drive-By Truckers have been touring and recording for about thirteen years. They’ve put out seven studio albums and a couple live sides, gently modifying their sound with each new release while staying true to the gritty subject matter they’ve chosen to depict. But no matter how much they tweak the arrangements they never give up the three guitars that decorate these records. The counter melodies these guitars contribute ebb and flow from left to right, supporting and complimenting the vocal part while never getting in its way. The rhythm section is equally restrained. They tend to choose just what’s right for the song whether they’re playing one of their famous “molasses in an igloo” dirges or an up tempo country punk rocker.
At the beginning of next month they release a collection of outtakes and previously unreleased material called The Fine Print. Most people tend to be skeptical of records like this because the songs on these musical grab bags weren’t released for a reason. However, the tracks that grace this compilation are the kind that most artists would build an album around. It’s hard to imagine why a tune like “When The Well Runs Dry” would ever hit the cutting room floor. This bleak portrayal of the people who we leave behind is exquisitely painful and is made even more so by the foundation laid by a churning, vibrato soaked organ. It’s a song that makes it mighty difficult to avoid hitting the repeat button.
This record also showcases Patterson Hood’s talent as an interpreter of other people’s material. It’s the first time they’ve released any covers on a full album and each one is better than the last. Like his take on Tom Petty’s “Rebels”. It’s full of that mix of tragic southern pride and bittersweet recklessness which has been such a landmark in Hood’s emotional range. Or there’s his interpretation of Warron Zevon’s “Play It All Night Long” which talks about the low points of country life. In this tune they make a bold statement by contradicting Lynyrd Skynyrd. After three verses of visceral descriptions of the shame and agony which is ever present in poor southern life Hood growls Zevon’s words as if they were written just for him:
There Ain’t much to country Livin’,
Sweat, Piss, Jizz, Blood,
Sweet Home Alabama play that dead man’s song,
Turn them speakers up full blast,
Play it all Night long.
Also present on the album is a version of “Like a Rolling Stone” and a heartbreaking Tom. T. Hall story-song about a Vietnam vet coming home in a wheelchair called “Mama Bake a Pie”. Hood not only makes each song his own, but molds them to fit into the vision DBT follows.
The most convincing reason as to why The Drive-By Truckers, and more specifically this record, are special; is their fearlessness towards paradox. Songs on this collection have a tendency to tell both sides of the story, often all but directly contradicting each other. Like on the third and fourth tracks where Mike Cooley talks about Wilson Dam flooding the holler where a man spent his life. The loss of his home and the way he grew accustomed to living eventually drives him to suicide. The very next track is Jason Isbell thanking the Tennessee Valley Authority (The organization which built the dam) for giving his family opportunities they otherwise wouldn’t have had. Both songwriters make each argument sound so convincing that it’s hard to know who to believe.
It’s not that they aren’t making a clear statement. Hood, Cooley, and Isbell are full of strong, often subversive, positions not just on the south but on life in general. It just so happens that these perspectives don’t always agree with each other. As the last chord rings and the world starts spinning again, you end up thinking about the problem in a way that makes a lot less sense, and so ultimately is a lot more realistic.
You Must Take The A Train
One of the best parts of the New York City public transit system is that stretch of the “A” train that passes between 125th street in Harlem and 59th street. When it’s running express it means 64 blocks of uninterrupted movement. Sure, it’s nice for napping or catching up on some reading, but what’s really great about this leg of the Blue Line is that it gives the subway performers a much longer span of time to perform. Acrobatic dance groups can stretch their routines another five minutes, street preachers can add a little extra depth to their sermons and the musicians are free to blow those extra 16 bars that the conductor and the sliding doors would otherwise have censored.
It’s probably unrealistic, but whenever I see a Tenor player riding the rails I think of King Curtis coming to New York in the early fifties and doing the same thing. Before he tore through that famous “Yakety Yak” solo, and much before “Soul Twist” bounced and prodded its way to the top of the R&B charts, I picture him as an eighteen year old kid from Mansfield, Texas with a beat up horn and a soulful, syncopated sound riding back and forth between Columbus Circle and 125th street. You can almost see him in a wide lapel with his meticulously maintained hair tightly slicked back. His church shoes, bright with the glare from the fluorescent subway lights, stand out against the dirty floor as he shares the sounds that would decorate records by everyone from Aretha Franklin to Buddy Holly. A train ride like that would be worth any MTA fare increase.
Unfortunately we can’t catch him entertaining strap-hangers anymore. All we have to go on are those divine records that he released. Classic instrumental cuts like his version of “Tennesse Waltz” or his take on “Ain’t That Good News” are enough to make even the most cynical wallflower tap their foot while slow dance tunes like “Bill Bailey” croon and plead with the utmost confidence. More than his chops or his tone, what’s really unique about King Curtis is his restraint. Like in “Tanya”, a mid-tempo feel-good groove originally penned by Joe Liggins. It’s just slow enough that most horn players wouldn’t be able to resist filling every phrase with their favorite fills, but Curtis lets the silence become a band member, comping him and providing a muted answer to his melodies.
Unlike most of the other great sax players of fifties and sixties Curtis was playing to the mainstream. Charlie Parker and John Coltrane were breaking down boundaries and creating new harmonic ideas in their own fields, but their sounds never had the layman appeal that seemed so natural to King Curtis. Maybe that’s why I don’t picture Coltrane on the A train, blowing “A Love Supreme” or Bird running up and down his Be Bop scales. Instead I see Curtis in his church shoes, playing for a car full of smiling faces
It’s probably unrealistic, but whenever I see a Tenor player riding the rails I think of King Curtis coming to New York in the early fifties and doing the same thing. Before he tore through that famous “Yakety Yak” solo, and much before “Soul Twist” bounced and prodded its way to the top of the R&B charts, I picture him as an eighteen year old kid from Mansfield, Texas with a beat up horn and a soulful, syncopated sound riding back and forth between Columbus Circle and 125th street. You can almost see him in a wide lapel with his meticulously maintained hair tightly slicked back. His church shoes, bright with the glare from the fluorescent subway lights, stand out against the dirty floor as he shares the sounds that would decorate records by everyone from Aretha Franklin to Buddy Holly. A train ride like that would be worth any MTA fare increase.
Unfortunately we can’t catch him entertaining strap-hangers anymore. All we have to go on are those divine records that he released. Classic instrumental cuts like his version of “Tennesse Waltz” or his take on “Ain’t That Good News” are enough to make even the most cynical wallflower tap their foot while slow dance tunes like “Bill Bailey” croon and plead with the utmost confidence. More than his chops or his tone, what’s really unique about King Curtis is his restraint. Like in “Tanya”, a mid-tempo feel-good groove originally penned by Joe Liggins. It’s just slow enough that most horn players wouldn’t be able to resist filling every phrase with their favorite fills, but Curtis lets the silence become a band member, comping him and providing a muted answer to his melodies.
Unlike most of the other great sax players of fifties and sixties Curtis was playing to the mainstream. Charlie Parker and John Coltrane were breaking down boundaries and creating new harmonic ideas in their own fields, but their sounds never had the layman appeal that seemed so natural to King Curtis. Maybe that’s why I don’t picture Coltrane on the A train, blowing “A Love Supreme” or Bird running up and down his Be Bop scales. Instead I see Curtis in his church shoes, playing for a car full of smiling faces
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