CD Review: Siena Root's Pioneers

For a crusty old fart like the Reverend, who has literally spent decades writing about what is sometimes dismissed as “classic rock,” there’s a certain amount of satisfaction in the fascination and affection shown by young bands (and fans ) for vintage rock ‘n’ roll. From psychedelic acid-casualties like Blue Cheer and Iron Butterfly to hard-rock dinosaurs like Grand Funk Railroad or Mountain, from blues-rockers like Cream or Zeppelin to bands that transcend genre like the Grateful Dead, there are a lot of kids these days grooving on sounds that were fresh when the Rev was a green young stoner.

Maybe it’s boredom pushing new audiences towards old music, maybe it’s ennui, but I personally think that it’s music fans looking for cheap thrills in a world where the charts are dominated by frippery from the likes of Ed Sheeran or Sam Smith rather than Deep Purple or the Doors. There’s only one so-called “rock” band with an album in the Billboard Top Ten as I write and, to be honest, calling Fall Out Boy a “rock” band is like saying that Gerry Cooney was the best heavyweight boxer of his era (kids, look it up). It’s no wonder that a growing segment of music buyers is traveling to the past to get their kicks.   

Siena Root’s Pioneers

Sweden’s Siena Root are no youngsters by any reckoning, not with better than fifteen years and a half-dozen albums under their belt, but they’re relative newcomers to the U.S. scene and, as newcomers to this shore, they’re forced to built an audience one highly-amplified riff at a time. Pioneers, the band’s fourth studio album and their stateside debut (released by Cleopatra Records), is hyped on a sticker affixed to the CD case as “a heavy blend of Deep Purple and Iron Butterfly.” While that’s an apt description, even a casual spin of Pioneers shows that there’s a lot more going on in these grooves than a band trying to re-create their record collection.

Pioneers cranks up the amps from the opening notes, “Between the Lines” a heavy, plodding rocker with fierce guitars, blustery rhythms, and chiming keyboards that would have sounded equally at home in the mid-1970s as they do some four decades later. Singer Jonas Åhlén has an amazingly Americanized voice, his deep, rich vox gliding effortlessly above the industrial-strength riffage cranked out by guitarist Matte Gustafsson. While the song takes a few interesting musical twists and turns, Gustafsson's piercing fretwork and Erik Petersson’s ever-present keyboards anchor the performance.

Roots Rock Pioneers

The heavy, chaotic “7 Years” rolls out with drummer Love Forsberg’s explosive percussive beats, which are quickly joined by guitar and organ riffs that come as close as anything on Pioneers to mimicking early Deep Purple. An inspired mix of prog-rock, proto-metal, and goofy cosmic smiles, “7 Years” is too doggone funky, instrumentally, to be a true throwback, the song instead representing more of an original take on a classic rock sound. “Roots Rock Pioneers,” from which the album’s title is derived, is a spunky slice o’ hard rock heaven, with flaming guitar licks and spry keyboard runs that mix a bit of Atomic Rooster with a cuppa Uriah Heep and a soupcon of Sabbath in the creation of a heady musical brew.

Gustafsson’s fretwork on “Roots Rock Pioneers” is imaginative and complex, taking bluesy flights of fancy that even Ritchie Blackmore dared not entertain, while Petersson’s inspired keyboard-pounding out-maneuvers both Jon Lord and Ken Hensley, managing to drive the rhythm while still providing stylistic flourishes to joust with the guitar. The dark-hued “The Way You Turn” is an equally intricate tune that successfully blends Sabbath’s excellent use of menacing atmospherics with the contemporary edge of fellow graven idol worshippers like Opeth or Clutch.

Whole Lotta Love

“Going Down” provides a surprising about-face, the boogie-tinged hard rocker swaggering proudly like Paul Rodgers and Bad Company while still delivering plenty of high-octane six-string pyrotechnics. Forsberg’s percussive efforts are particularly impressive here, the drummer holding down the bottom end behind Gustafsson’s soaring leads with a masterful combination of heavy beats and light-fingered brushes. Bassist Sam Riffer deserves some credit here as well – while his presence is seemingly lost in the Sturm und Drang of the band’s lead instrumentalists, his steady hand provides the backbone the songs need to rip ‘n’ roar.

Siena Root’s “In My Kitchen” might be considered a blatant Doors rip-off by the unknowing, and while they do “appropriate” a certain ambiance and instrumentation from “Riders On The Storm” to open this exhilarating nine-minute-plus jam, they end up traveling to musical netherworlds that Jim Morrison only imagined in his dreams. A potent blend of psychedelic and bluesy hard-rock with out-of-this-world guitarplay, haunting rhythms, and Åhlén’s breathtaking vocals, the song’s lengthy, ethereal instrumental passage offers up enough spacey guitar licks, buzzing keyboards, and staggering percussion to satisfy any old-school rock aficionado.

The band’s reading of Led Zeppelin’s “Whole Lotta Love” is the album’s lone cover, a slightly skewed take on the classic rock gem that manages to capture the song’s bombastic spirit while offering an imaginative re-shaping of Jimmy Page’s original vision. Seemingly recorded in a cave, Åhlén’s leathery vocals rise above the din created by Gustafsson’s razor-sharp fretwork and Forsberg’s machinegun drumbeats to breathe new life into the song while the muted, echoed effect provided the performance offers a canvas for the virtuoso instrumentation.         

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

Siena Root’s Pioneers is a solid collection of swaggering, Marshall-stacked, hard-knocking cock-rock the likes of which we’ve seen little of since the Stones went disco in the late 1970s. Providing a fresh perspective on a sound seemingly mined down to the last ounce of proverbial gold by the likes of Zeppelin, Purple, Heep, and Sabbath, Siena Root are one of a new breed of rock ‘n’ roll true believers using classic rock influences in the creation of an inspired contemporary sound that, while dismissed as yesterday’s news, is nonetheless earning the band a legion of fans worldwide.

With Pioneers, Siena Root joins the ranks of fellow travelers like Admiral Sir Cloudsley Shovell, Blues Pills, Handsome Jack, and Rival Sons – among a handful of others – in joyfully reveling in the sounds of the past while creating a bright new future for rock ‘n’ roll. Grade: B+ (Cleopatra Records, released November 17, 2014)

Buy the CD from Amazon.com: Siena Root's Pioneers

CD Preview: Vanilla Fudge’s Spirit of ‘67

Vanilla Fudge holds a special place in the history of rock music. Emerging from the mid-1960s psychedelic hard rock scene that also boasted of bands like Iron Butterfly and Blue Cheer, the NYC foursome developed a truly unique, HEAVY sound that would influence bands like Deep Purple and Uriah Heep, and echoes of the low ‘n’ slow Fudge style can even be heard in the production work of late Houston rapper DJ Screw.

On March 3rd, 2015 Vanilla Fudge will release Spirit of ’76 on Purple Pyramid Records (an imprint of Cleopatra Records). Featuring ten cover songs that were popular during the “Summer of Love” – the year the band released its debut album – along with one original number written by founding member Mark Stein, Spirit of ’76 is the band’s first new album since 2007’s Out Through The In Door.    

The original Vanilla Fudge, consisting of singer and keyboardist Mark Stein, guitarist Vinny Martell, bassist Tim Bogert, and drummer Carmine Appice, came to the attention of legendary product George “Shadow” Morton, who was taken with the band’s slowed-down, sludge-drenched cover of the Supremes’ hit “You Keep Me Hangin’ On.” The band recorded the song with Morton producing, which scored them a deal with Atco Records (an Atlantic label subsidiary), and their subsequent self-titled 1967 debut album.

That album rose to number six on the Billboard albums chart on the strength of the band’s original take on popular songs by the Beatles, Sonny Bono, Curtis Mayfield, and Rod Argent. Slowing down each song’s tempo, layering in a rich brew of Stein’s Hammond keyboards and Martell’s stinging guitar, and backed by the sludge-like stew of Bogert and Appice’s mesmerizing rhythms, the album struck a chord with young rock fans. Morton would go on to produce the band’s next two albums, both of which went Top 20, but the further the band strayed from that initial plodding approach to cover tunes, the more their commercial returns diminished, and Vanilla Fudge after the release of their fourth album, Rock & Roll.

Spirit of ’76 represents a return to that legendary psychedelic soul-tinged Vanilla Fudge sound. The album features the talents of most of the original band members – bassist Tim Bogert retired in 2011, to be replaced by Pete Bremy, who played with Appice in a recently reunited Cactus. In a press release for the new album, Appice says that Spirit of ’76 is “the best album we've done since our very first album, with great vocal arrangements and instrumental performances from everyone in the band.” Mark Stein adds “Spirit of ’76 is a record that I'm proud of. The success of Vanilla Fudge has always been based on our interpretations of songs by great artists. Our style of classic and symphonic rock lives large on this effort, and the performances and arrangements I would hope will be enjoyed by old and new fans alike.”

We have the full track list below, Spirit of ’76 featuring imaginative re-makes of classic tunes like the Box Tops’ “The Letter,” the Spencer Davis Group’s “Gimme Some Lovin’,” the Monkees’ “I’m A Believer,” Buffalo Springfield’s “For What It’s Worth,” and Procol Harum’s “Whiter Shade of Pale.” Guitarist Vinny Martell says “Spirit of ‘76 is the continuation of the journey we began in the Summer of Love – psychedelic, rhythmically powerful arrangements and performances of happening tunes of that era colored by the insight and vision of who we are today.”

Stein’s “Let’s Pray For Peace” is the album’s only original song which, he says, “is about a vision I had that came to me suddenly as if my supreme being was speaking through me…what if all of us could stop for a moment, as naive as it may sound to some, and say: 'who'd like to share, a little silent prayer, let's pray for peace tonight’.”

Unlike a lot of reunited 1960s-era bands, Vanilla Fudge’s members have been busy playing music since their first break-up in 1970. Bogert and Appice formed the beloved blues-rock outfit Cactus with former Mitch Ryder guitarist Jim McCarty and Amboy Dukes frontman Rusty Day, releasing four albums between 1970 and 1972; reuniting for a pair of Cactus studio albums and several live performances in 2006. Bogert and Appice formed a power trio with guitarist Jeff Beck in ’73, scoring a Gold™ album with the self-titled Beck, Bogert & Appice album in 1973.

Bogert and Appice backed up a literal “who’s who” of popular music throughout the 1980s and ‘90s, including Rod Stewart, Leslie West, Bo Diddley, and Pat Travers, among others. Mark Stein stayed busy as well, touring and recording with artists like Dave Mason, Tommy Bolin, and Alice Cooper before Vanilla Fudge re-formed in 2000. The band will be touring in support of Spirit of ’76, so watch for a Vanilla Fudge show near you!

Vanilla Fudge’s Spirit of ’67 Track List:

1.   I Heard It Through The Grapevine
2.  The Letter
3.  I Can See For Miles
4.  Break On Through (To The Other Side)
5.  The Tracks of My Tears
6.  I'm A Believer
7.  Gimme Some Lovin'
8.  For What It's Worth
9.  Ruby Tuesday
10. Whiter Shade of Pale
11. Let's Pray For Peace

Buy the CD from Amazon.com: Vanilla Fudge's Spirit of '67

Thin Lizzy vinyl from Light In The Attic Records

Light In The Attic Records has announced that it will be reissuing two early Thin Lizzy albums –Shades of A Blue Orphanage and Vagabonds of the Western World – on vinyl in March.

Thin Lizzy’s sophomore effort, Shades of A Blue Orphanage was originally released in 1972, the album representing somewhat of a letdown after the band’s encouraging debut from the previous year. The band at the time was a trio with singer/bassist Phil Lynott, guitarist Eric Bell, and drummer Brian Downey. They had yet to develop their trademark, devastating twin-guitar sound, instead delivering an inconsistent blend of bluesy hard rock and psychedelic pop.

Although All Music Guide writer Eduardo Rivadavia considered Shades “disappointing,” noted critic Martin Popoff, author of three books on the band, calls it “grand and intimate at once.” Vagabonds of the Western World was released in late 1973; a non-album, hard-rocking single release of the traditional Irish song “Whiskey In The Jar” scored the band an unlikely Top Ten U.K. hit, affording them more time and resources to record their third album.

Still, the trio is obviously still searching for its unique sound with Vagabonds, which evinces a similar musical mix as its predecessor. Citing the album’s “style-searching waywardness,” Popoff states that Vagabonds “continues with a forging of the band’s sound under a variety of stylistic auspices.” Rivadavia is more generous in his perspective on the album, saying that it is “brimming with attitude and dangerous swagger,” concluding that the album’s improved production helped create the band’s “first sonically satisfying album.”

Eric Bell left the band after Vagabonds of the Western World, to be replaced by two guitarists – Scott Gorham and Brian Robertston – who would eventually create the signature Thin Lizzy sound. The band also left the clueless Decca Records, which had no idea how to record or market a hard-rock band, for Vertigo, a more progressive imprint that would allow Lizzy time to develop an artistic voice that culminated in 1976’s breakthrough album, Jailbreak.

Both Shades of A Blue Orphanage and Vagabonds of the Western World offer valuable insight into the band’s creative evolution, and both are entertaining when separated from pre-conceived expectations created by Lizzy’s better-known late-career recordings. Both albums are worthy of a place in your collection, the LITA reissues featuring deluxe gatefold jackets, 180-gram vinyl, in-depth liner notes, and rare archive photos.

Pre-orders of both albums (as well as the label’s previous vinyl reissue of Thin Lizzy’s self-titled debut album) are available on the Light In The Attic website as individual LPs and as two or three-album bundles to save some of your hard-earned coin.

Crowdfunding: Create An Album With Ted Drozdowski's Scissormen!

Nashville bluesman Ted Drozdowski and his band the Scissormen have launched an Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign to raise money to finance their new album, titled Love & Life. So, you ask, “why should I care about some guy whose name I can’t say, much less spell, and cough up the coin to help unleash another indie record on the weak-willed public?” 

Well, Bunkie, if the Reverend’s inspired word from on high isn’t enough to get you to crack open that dusty, moth-eaten bankbook of yours, or prompt you to take a sledge hammer and blowtorch to your titanium piggy bank, then how about this – Drozdowski is no latecomer to the blues party like some folks asking for your donation. No, ol’ Ted is a lifer, an award-winning music journalist and critically-acclaimed musician with more than a few decades in the trenches.

Drozdowski acquits himself nicely in the balancing act between critic and artist, Thalia and Melpomene as it were, the man both a knowledgeable and entertaining writer about music as well as a fiery, talented guitarist and songwriter thoroughly steeped in the history and tradition of the blues. If that’s not enough to engage your sense of guilt and motivate you to part with your paycheck, then consider this…the Scissormen have a proven track record of excellence. Recent albums like 2008’s Luck In A Hurry or 2012’s Big Shoes: Walking and Talking the Blues, a collaboration with documentary filmmaker Robert Mugge, have garnered a truckload of accolades and entertained audiences across this spinning green rock.

If you care a lick about the blues, check out Ted’s video for Love & Life on his Indiegogo page and then be prepared to part with some cash for this worthy project. If you don’t donate, I’ll forever haunt your dreams (which, to be honest, I may just do anyway for the lulz). Give 'em a listen, below... 

CD Review: Supertramp's Crime of the Century (deluxe edition)

Supertramp’s third album, Crime of the Century, was essentially the work of a brand new band. Formed in 1969 by keyboardist and singer Rick Davies, Supertramp originally enjoyed financial support from a Dutch millionaire and, after scoring a deal with A&M Records, the band recorded a pair of art-rock albums for the label that were released in 1970 and ‘71. Mixing progressive rock virtuosity with British pop sensibilities, the two records served more as a showcase for the individual band member’s instrumental skills than as a true creative statement. Neither album sold particularly well so when their benefactor withdrew his patronage, Supertramp essentially broke up.

Davies and fellow founding member Roger Hodgson (vocals, guitar) worked to put together a new Supertramp, recruiting American drummer Bob C. Benberg from pub-rockers Bees Make Honey, and making Dougie Thomson, who had already been substituting on bass, a full-time member. Thomson brought in his former Alan Bown Set bandmate John Helliwell (saxophone) and what is today known as the classic Supertramp line-up was formed. This was the band that would record Crime of the Century with producer/engineer Ken Scott, who had worked previously with the Beatles, David Bowie, and Pink Floyd. Whereas previously Davies and Hodgson had written songs together, the widening gap in their interests and lives spurred them to begin writing individually, resulting in a glut of material.

Supertramp’s Crime of the Century

The band entered the studio with a surplus of great songs, many of which would end up on subsequent albums. Crime of the Century tempered the band’s previous overt progressive tendencies with more of a pop-rock sheen. Although the new players were every bit as talented as the earlier members (if not more so), the complex songs were less a display of instrumental virtuosity than they were careful constructs of sound melody. Producer Scott pushed the band to think outside of the box and utilize the studio as an instrument in itself, and to incorporate non-traditional sounds into their songs. Not that Supertramp entirely abandoned their prog-rock proclivities – the album’s opening track, “School,” is somewhat the best of both worlds, featuring lush instrumentation and extended musical passages alongside its pop melody.

The album’s second single, “Bloody Well Right,” was indicative of the band’s new direction, showcasing a more muscular, hard rock sound with proggy overtones that depended on Hodgson’s imaginative fretwork and the song’s distinctive chorus. The addition of Helliwell’s soulful sax playing fleshed out the song’s minimal lyrics and helped catch the ears of U.S. audiences, which sent the song into the Top 40. By contrast, the album’s other single release – Hodgson’s “Dreamer” – didn’t chart at all stateside but rose to #13 in the band’s U.K. homeland. It’s a whimsical performance, Hodgson’s lofty vocals assisted by Davies’ busy, insistent keyboard line. The vocal harmonies weren’t dissimilar to what Queen was doing at the time, but the song’s syncopated rhythms and ethereal vocals help create a mesmerizing listening experience.

If Everyone Was Listening

If Crime of the Century is remembering today entirely on the basis of “Bloody Well Right” and “Dreamer,” that would be legacy enough, but there are plenty of other strong songs on the album that many band members consider Supertramp’s creative pinnacle. Davies’ subtle piano flourishes on “Hide In Your Shell” mimic melodic themes he uses throughout the album, tying all the songs together as a single related composition. The song’s instrumentation is somewhat proggy and artful, often working at odd angles to the vocals, resulting in a breathtaking performance. Ostensibly the protagonist behind the album’s loosely-conceptual lyrical themes of loneliness and alienation, “Rudy” provides a showcase for Davies’ fluid keyboards, the song’s jazzy undercurrent and Hodgson’s biting guitar solos providing a counterpoint to the frequently minimalist instrumentation, at times placing an emphasis on the lyrics and at other times serving to create a moody ambience.

Hodgson’s “If Everyone Was Listening” is the album’s most orchestral track, its swelling instrumentation and busy arrangement sounding not unlike Dark Side of the Moon era Pink Floyd. Davies was a far different piano player than Rick Wright, however, his flailing ivories adding a much more atonal, almost improvisational-jazz styled vibe to the song, an idea that is only bolstered by Helliwell’s flashes of mournful sax. Benberg’s drumming is superb here, not so much keeping time as in providing instrumental support to the often fey effects of the accompanying strings and melancholy piano. The album’s title track is a minor classic in itself, its construction also in a Pink Floyd vein, orchestral passages creating a stark ambience with the occasional jolts of piano, sax, or guitar, while its raucous shouted vocals pre-date Roger Waters’ The Wall by several years.

     

Live At The Hammersmith Odeon 1975

The “deluxe” 2014 reissue of Crime of the Century includes a bonus disc that documents a March 1975 performance by the band at the Hammersmith Odeon. Just as Supertramp had collaborated with producer Ken Scott to create a new sonic paradigm in the studio, the band’s management worked with electronics experts to create an innovative sound system to properly reproduce the band’s complex music in a live setting. The results speak for themselves, as the Hammersmith Odeon performance sounds every bit as crystalline and aurally engaging as the original album itself. The live set begins with the first four songs from the album, expanded a bit, perhaps, from the LP versions with a little more instrumentation, but nothing too ostentatious, the band pretty much recreating the album tracks with the addition of small, interesting instrumental flourishes.

Supertramp veer off course by the fifth song, however, the band drawing upon the material they had stockpiled to deliver a taste of their upcoming album, Crisis? What Crisis? Featuring four songs from that album, which would be released in late 1975, the new songs don’t stray that far from the sound the band had crafted for Crime of the Century. “Sister Moonshine” offers up some nice vocal interplay, the arrangement highlighted by Davies’ gentle keyboard runs while “Lady,” the lead-off single from the 1975 album, is a nifty pop triumph with lively vocals and keyboards. The odd man here is “A – You’re Adorable,” a 1940s-era pop song that was a hit for Perry Como and Jo Stafford, spoken/sung here by saxman Helliwell, who provides muted, slightly-crooning vocals above Davies’ discordant piano. The band closes out the live set with the four remaining songs from Crime of the Century, highlighted by the title track, which is provided a stunning instrumental performance.
      

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

Crime of the Century was considered Supertramp’s commercial breakthrough, the album yielding a pair of minor hit singles in what was an increasingly album-oriented rock ‘n’ roll world. The album rose as high as #38 on the U.S. charts on its way to Gold™ Record status (for 500,000+ copies sold) while it hit a lofty #4 on the charts in the U.K. It was also somewhat of a worldwide success, charting Top 10 in Canada and Germany and Top 20 in Australia and France while also developing a following in the Netherlands. More importantly, Crime of the Century provided the band with a musical blueprint that, although it would take two more modestly-successful albums to perfect, would emerge at the end of the decade with Supertramp’s 1979 smash hit LP Breakfast In America.

The creative tensions and lifestyle differences that had pushed Davies and Hodgson to become individual songwriters also provided Supertramp with a fascinating complexity and dichotomy of sound that transcended the band’s prog-rock roots to bring something uniquely exquisite in its stead. Although Supertramp is often denied the respect and admiration provided contemporaries like Yes, Pink Floyd, or Genesis, their influence can be heard today in like-minded prog-pop outfits like Spock’s Beard and the Flower Kings. From humble beginnings, Crime of the Century pushed Supertramp onto a world stage and cemented the band’s considerable musical legacy. Although this 40th anniversary reissue of the album lacks any studio outtakes, the addition of a live disc and an illustrated booklet with well-written (and extensive) new liner notes should prompt fans to upgrade their old CDs. Grade: A- (A&M Records, released September 1974, reissued December 2014)

Buy the CD from Amazon.com: Supertramp's Crime of the Century (40th Anniversary Deluxe Edition)

Harvey ‘The Snake’ Mandel Six-Disc Box Coming!

Blues-rock guitarist Harvey Mandel has long been a favorite ‘round these parts, the underrated, innovative fretburner seldom getting the credit he deserves for all the great music he’s made through the years. Sadly, many of his best solo recordings have long been out of print and copies have been more painful than a root canal to scratch up. Luckily, Purple Pyramid Records will be fixing this unfortunate situation when they release the limited edition, six-disc Snake Box set comprised of Mandel’s classic first five solo albums and a sixth bonus disc with an unreleased 1968 concert recording.

Born in Detroit but raised in Chicago, Mandel fell under the spell of the blues at an early age, and the first time we heard of the young guitarist was as part of Charlie Musselwhite’s South Side Band. Mandel appeared on Musselwhite’s Stand Back! LP, widely considered to be one of the best Chicago blues albums of all time, with Mandel adding his imaginative fretwork behind the frontman’s soulful, frenetic harp playing. Moving to the San Francisco Bay area, Mandel fell in with like-minded artists and was convinced by Blue Cheer producer Abe “Voco” Kesh to record a solo album, resulting in his acclaimed 1968 instrumental debut, Cristo Redentor.

After releasing his second solo effort, 1969’s Righteous, Mandel replaced Henry Vestine as lead guitarist of the legendary blues-rock outfit Canned Heat. The Woodstock Festival was Mandel’s third show with the band, and he’d go on to tour extensively and record three albums with Canned Heat, including the band’s landmark Future Blues LP. Recruited by British blues-rock legend John Mayall, Mandel joined the Bluesbreakers in 1970, appearing on three albums with Mayall, including 1971’s classic Back To The Roots. In between Canned Heat and the Bluesbreakers, Mandel released his third solo album, 1970’s Games Guitars Play, his first recorded with a vocalist.

Leaving Mayall’s band, Mandel returned to his solo career, releasing what his considered his best work, 1971’s Baby Batter, the album a masterful and influential hybrid of blues, jazz, and rock instrumentals that included former Canned Heat/Bluesbreakers bandmate Larry Taylor on bass. Mandel veered towards jazz-rock fusion with 1972’s The Snake album, his fifth, which also featured former Mayall/Zappa violinist Don “Sugarcane” Harris, with whom he would form the short-lived band Pure Food and Drug Act, which released a single 1972 album, Choice Cuts. Mandel has continued to record solo through the present day, as well as performing with a reformed Canned Heat through much of the 2000s.

Mandel somehow found time to audition for Mick Taylor’s spot in the Rolling Stones in the mid-1970s; he didn’t get the gig, but he appears on two songs – “Hot Stuff” and “Memory Motel” – from the band’s 1976 album Black and Blue. Through the years, Mandel has also lent his six-string skills to recordings by the Ventures, Graham Bond, Love, and bluesman Jimmy Witherspoon, among others, as well as playing on several albums from his old Chicago running buddy Barry Goldberg and his former Bluesbreakers bandmate “Sugarcane” Harris. Mandel’s innovative two-handed fretboard tapping technique – first used by The Snake in 1973 – would influence a generation of rock guitarists to follow, including Eddie Van Halen and Steve Vai.     

Each CD in the Snake Box is packaged in its own sleeve with the original album artwork, and the set includes a full-color booklet with new liner notes. Amazon.com has a pre-order page up with the set priced at around $36, which works out to $6 per disc…not a lot of money for a heck of a lot of fine music. Whether you’re a long-time Harvey Mandel fan or a newcomer, this is one set you’re going to want to get behind!

Buy the CD from Amazon.com: Harvey Mandel's Snake Box

 

Alligator Records Releases Nine Digital-Only Collections

Chicago blues institution Alligator Records may be pushing 50 years old, but the label continues to swing with the times, signing talented young artists like Selwyn Birchwood and Jarekus Singleton, essentially promoting both the future of the blues with new artists, and the music’s past with a catalog of essential blues music.

In promoting this rich back catalog of great music, Alligator Records has announced the January 15, 2015 digital-only release of nine “best of” albums that represent an impressive slate of artists. Koko Taylor, Hound Dog Taylor, James Cotton, Coco Montoya, Tinsley Ellis, Lil’ Ed and the Blues Imperials, Roomful of Blues, Eric Lindell, and Lonnie Mack will all have the best of their best recorded for Alligator released as digital albums. Each “best of” set features between 15 and 20 songs and runs from 70 to 90 minutes, and will be available for download from iTunes, Amazon.com and other major digital music retailers.

Label founder Bruce Iglauer has chosen a great set of artists to represent the diversity and electricity of Alligator Records, and he personally re-mastered each “best of” album. Although all of these artists are worthy of your time and monetary investment, if pressed I’d have to choose three traditional artists to begin with – Koko Taylor, Hound Dog Taylor, and James Cotton. Miss Koko was the “Queen of Chicago Blues” until her death in 2009 and The Best of Koko Taylor features 17 songs that span the entirety of her lengthy tenure with Alligator, including such classic cuts as “Wang Dang Doodle,” “I’m A Woman,” “Evil,” and “Let The Good Times Roll.”

James Cotton’s musical legacy is well-established, the harp wizard honing his skills with the great Muddy Waters before launching a solo career that continues to this day, resulting in the award-winning 2013 album Cotton Mouth Man. The digital The Best of James Cotton offers 17 great performances running over 75 minutes, featuring both live and studio tracks, including material from the acclaimed Harp Attack! album Cotton recorded with fellow harmonica masters Junior Wells, Carey Bell, and Billy Branch.

Chicago blues legend Hound Dog Taylor is the reason why Alligator Records exists, Iglauer originally forming the imprint to record the guitarist and capture his electrifying mojo on disc for posterity. Better than 43 years later, the late Taylor remains one of Alligator’s signature artists, and The Best of Hound Dog Taylor features 18 houserockin’ songs, including seven live cuts, and offers up such raucous tracks as “Give Me Back My Wig,” “Don’t Blame Me,” “She’s Gone,” and a scorching live version of “Kitchen Sink Boogie” among its 72+ minute running time.    

According to Iglauer, re-listening and re-mastering these classic blues tracks was not an easy task. “It was a very enjoyable but tough job choosing which tracks constitute the ‘best’ of these great artists. We chose their biggest radio songs and most-requested fan favorites, but also included some tracks that we consider unrecognized gems among their recordings. New fans will find these a great introduction to these artists, and established fans will find tracks they may be unaware of. I think the re-mastering brings out more details of the music and makes the listener appreciate the quality of these performances even more.”

Foghat & J. Geils Band Top Real Gone Music’s March Slate

The esteemed archive label Real Gone Music is getting in on the vinyl craze with two rockin’ reissues of gems from the 1970s – Foghat’s 1977 album Live and the J. Geils Band’s 1973 album Bloodshot, both albums scheduled to be released on March 3, 2015.

Foghat had been on a roll during the mid-1970s, enjoying a trio of Top 40 charting albums: 1974’s Energized, 1975’s Fool For The City (their biggest, at #23), and 1976’s Night Shift (#36), all of which spawned hit singles to fuel their chart positions. Foghat was one of the most popular of the decade’s arena-rock bands, offering ticket-buyers a lot of value for their dollar with a high-octane, high-energy blend of rock, blues, and boogie. Thus, it was only natural, given the overwhelming commercial success of live rock ‘n’ roll LPs during this era (see Peter Frampton, Kiss, Bob Seger, et al), that Foghat’s record label, Bearsville, would release a live disc on the band, 1977’s imaginatively-named Live.

What the album lacked in creative titling it more than made up for with righteous rock ‘n’ roll jams, Live featuring on-stage versions of fan favorites like “Slow Ride” (which rode the charts to #20), “Fool For The City,” and “I Just Want To Make Love To You,” which served to push the album to #11 on the charts. There were but six songs on Live, the album running roughly 38 minutes, but guitarists “Lonesome” Dave Peverett and Rod Price, bassist Craig MacGregor, and drummer Roger Earl made the most of the time, delivering a red-hot set that has withstood the test of time. Real Gone is bringing the legendary set back to hot wax with a 180gr vinyl reissue with limited-edition package that reproduces the original die-cut jacket and four-color inner sleeve.

The third studio album from Boston’s J. Geils Band temporarily lifted the band into the upper reaches of the rock ‘n’ roll stratosphere. Bloodshot, originally released in 1973, would rise to #10 on the charts on the strength of the album’s Top 30 single, “Give It To Me.” The band had already developed a reputation as scorching live performers, the Geils crew’s dynamic live set only partially captured on wax by the previous year’s “Live” Full House LP. Bloodshot offered up nine hard-charging tracks, a combo of bluesy rock, R&B, and soul that, along with the aforementioned hit, would feature great songs like “Southside Shuffle” and “(Ain’t Nothing But A) House Party.” This 180gr vinyl reissue has been pressed on gorgeous red wax with vintage Atlantic Records labels; both the Foghat and J. Geils Band LP reissues were re-mastered and the lacquer cut by Peter Black.

CD Review: Dick Wagner's Dick Wagner

Chances are that you’re familiar with guitarist and songwriter Dick Wagner’s talents even if you don’t recognize his name. As frontman for the mid-to-late 1960s Motor City hard rock outfit Frost, Wagner was a contemporary of such legends as the MC5, the Stooges, Bob Seger, and Ted Nugent and the Amboy Dukes. After Frost had run its course, Wagner formed the power trio Ursa Major (with former Amboy Dukes bassist Greg Arama). That band’s lone Bob Ezrin-produced 1972 magnum opus a magnificent beast of shimmering, buzzing guitarwork, explosive rhythms, and Wagner’s wordy, Dylanesque lyrics that went absolutely nowhere on the charts.

Although Ursa Major’s self-titled LP flopped and the band broke-up, Wagner developed a friendship with their young producer and Ezrin – fresh off a hit with Alice Cooper’s School’s Out album – would use Wagner as his secret weapon in the studio. The guitarist would record and tour with Cooper throughout his initial solo years and well into the 1980s, writing hits like “Only Women Bleed” and “I Never Cry.” Ezrin partnered Wagner and fellow Detroit guitarist Steve Hunter with Lou Reed, the pair bringing lightning to the Hall of Famer’s Berlin and thunder to Rock N’ Roll Animal. Wagner would later play on sessions (and hits) by Etta James, Peter Gabriel, Hall & Oates, and Kiss (playing acoustic guitar on “Beth”). It was the dueling guitars of Wagner and Hunter that set fire to Aerosmith’s “Train Kept A-Rollin’,” from the band’s Get Your Wings.

Dick Wagner’s Solo Debut Album

Given their friendship and strong working relationship, it was only natural that Ezrin would produce Wagner’s 1978 solo debut album. Both men pulled names from their extensive Rolodexes, lining up a talented studio band for the project that included guitarists Steve Hunter and Domenic Trioano (from the James Gang); bassists Prakash John (Parliament/Funkadelic) and Bob Babbitt; and drummers Whitey Glan and Allan Schwartzberg. Considering Wagner’s hard rock credentials, his solo debut comes across – at first blush – as a relatively lightweight affair…kind of like a boxer dropping pounds to punch down in a lower weight class. That doesn’t make it a bad album, just an unexpected cruiserweight effort, with a greater reliance on melody and songcraft than previous, which would serve Wagner’s songwriting efforts well in the future.

The album opens with a cover of Andy Pratt’s elegant “Some Things Go On Forever,” a piano-driven ballad that manages to channel a bit of the old Ursa Major magic nonetheless with intertwined guitars and beefy rhythms. “Don’t Stop The Music” is a similar construct, albeit a Wagner original, and it treads awfully close to Gary Wright/“Dreamweaver” turf with a chiffon arrangement, ethereal instrumentation, floating vocals, and Ernie Watt’s wired jazz-funk sax solo playing off of Wagner’s soulful fretwork. The song itself is an ode to rock ‘n’ roll and the DJs playing it on the radio, lyrically wrapped with a bow and concealing a deceptive romantic undercurrent.

Go Down Together

Lyrically, “Nightwork” echoes Wagner’s late-career return to the blues, the song a hard-luck tale turned smooth R&B romp with sultry backing vocals and subtle horn flourishes. It’s Wagner’s fluid guitarplay that stands out, though, driving the performance into a more soulful corner, the guitarist mixing scraps of Ernie Isley, George Benson, and Sly Stone in creating his own bluesy, funky contemporary edge. By contrast, “Heartlands” comes across as a country-flavored, Segeresque symphony with acoustic git pickin’ and a folkish lyrical slant with Wagner’s plaintive vocals up front and high in the mix, wearing his sentiment on his sleeve before the entire band kicks in and swerves the entire affair into the melancholy-tinged “Oceans.”

With a little louder guitars and a tougher arrangement, I could easily see “Oceans” as an Ursa Major jam. It’s more nuanced here, though, with swelling, lush instrumentation; obligatory whale cries in the background (it was the late 1970s, after all…); and some prog-rock styled playing that wouldn’t sound out-of-place on a Pink Floyd album. “Go Down Together” is the album’s foot-stomper, Wagner’s opening solo knocking down anything “Terrible” Ted tried to do during the decade. An up-tempo six-string rocker with honky-tonk piano, strident rhythms, and sizzling fretwork, it’s one of Wagner’s finest rock ‘n’ roll moments with a great storyline and an overall vibe that could have made it a big hit if FM radio hadn’t gone all wussy and corporate by ’78.

Motor City Showdown

Swerving the listener once again, “Small Town Boy” is nifty lil’ slice of pop-rock fluff with island rhythms not all that far, aesthetically, from Pablo Cruise or, better, Jay Ferguson’s “Thunder Island,” about as radio-friendly a tune as you’d find in the era. Wagner takes his cue from Nashville with the country-rock tune “Hand Me Down Heartaches,” a lovely melody surrounding finely-crafted lyrics and backed by the slightest of twangy instrumentation that works mostly because of Wagner’s earnest, emotionally-charged vocals. It’s a song ripe for rediscovery by a Music Row establishment hungry for new material.

Wagner closes his solo debut with the grandiloquent “Motor City Showdown,” a street-savvy medium-tempo soft-rocker just a step away from Jim Steinman with its swells of orchestration surrounding and coddling Wagner’s oblique ‘Sharks vs. Jets’ story-song lyrics. It’s a strange but effective song to end the album with, veering dangerously close to the prog-rock edge in its ambition but with an undeniable singer/songwriter veneer lying close to the surface. It’s a gorgeous performance, and the musicians imbue it with a sort of majesty and grandeur that’s out-of-sync with contemporary rock sounds (circa 1978). Appropriately, Wagner’s searing guitar solo is threaded through the outro, ending the album with a quiet dignity.     

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

As a major fan of Wagner and his late 1960s/early 1970s bands Frost and Ursa Major, as well as his sideman work, I still somehow missed hearing this album when it was first released. I might have been surprised at the time if I had heard it at the time; and maybe only a little less so in hearing it now, given its ambitious performances and the often lush arrangements provided Wagner’s frequent power ballads. The album sold poorly in spite of the guitarist’s reputation – a reality ascribed to Atlantic Records’ enormous blunder of naming the disc Richard Wagner (rather than Dick Wagner, the name by which he performed), which allegedly confused record stores into stocking it in the classical music section. With this long-overdue reissue, Real Gone Music has corrected this mistake and re-titled the album Dick Wagner. 

Decidedly less blustery than much of Wagner’s earlier band work, his never less than stellar guitar playing provides the steely muscle rippling beneath the surface of many of the album’s songs. Dick Wagner is definitely an album of its time, and yet also curiously out-of-step with late ‘70s trends in rock music, which just further spotlights Wagner’s unique vision and talents. If you’re not expecting the second coming of Frost or a sequel to Rock N Roll Animal, you’ll find a lot to like among the lofty pop-rock tunes to be found on Dick Wagner. Grade: B (Real Gone Music, released November 4, 2014)

Buy the CD from Amazon.com: Dick Wagner's Dick Wagner