Ronan Gallagher Time Waits For No One Modal Citizen
Ronan Gallagher is a man in a hurry. The Leitrim man only came to learning guitar and creating music in his mid-life and this second album comes hot on the heels of his 2019 debut record, ALWAYS BROKE NEVER BROKEN. ‘Life is out there waiting, live it while you can’, from the title track, is the overriding theme of this record, perhaps partly fuelled by Gallagher’s recent medical issues. Over the eleven original songs, there’s hardly any let up from the manic opening pace, and Donegal producer Marc Geagan has chosen a large cast of local musicians to imbibe the album with a Celtic americana sound.
The aforementioned Time Waits For No One is a country meets rock ‘n roll rollercoaster ride, with an insistent back beat from drummer Michael Christie, the interplay of Damien McGeehan’s fiddle and Seanan Brennan’s mandolin, and layers of electric guitar licks from various players complementing Gallagher’s gritty vocals. The pace continues on Out of my Head, the electric organ (Enda Ferriter) and some killer harmonica (Sean Debney) giving the song of heartbreak a blues rock feel. Another song of longing, The World is an Empty Place, continues the disillusionment theme, as does the mid-paced rock n’ soul road song, Looking For Something.
Miss You is quite a departure - the tongue in cheek woefully mournful country blues (think Hank Williams at his most depressed) features some fabulously over the top backing vocals from Farah Bogle, and the wonderful Richard Nelson’s pedal steel playing.
Liberty is another manic country rock message, expressing Gallagher’s disillusionment with politics and capitalism, and is a call for environmental rescue, with a ripping Albert Lee style guitar solo from local legend Johnny Gallagher (no relation). More highlighting of impending environmental disaster is expressed in the powerfully apocalyptic The World is Burning, with a notable contribution from Rory Corbett on 5 string banjo. The Argumental Man tells us that ‘he won’t back down, he won’t conform’ and ‘he’s doing what he can’, clearly an autobiographical message, backed up here by horns and electric organ. Live Life To The Full ends on a positive and hopeful note.
The striking cover art features a small terrier gazing up into a galaxy of stars - as quirky as the album itself. Check it out.
Review by Eilís Boland
Tim Grimm Gone Cavalier
The latest release from Tim Grimm continues his recent musical path with thoughtful, lyrical songs of life recorded in a restrained setting and for the most part built around Grimm’s vocal warmth and intimacy. This is inherently central to the opening song A Dream, which is about remembering a girl from faraway. That song is followed by the similarly themed Carry Us Away - wherein Grimm announces that he “will search within you for a thing we’ll never find,” offering that feeling of companionship even when apart. Both of these are imbued with an understated naturalness. Cadillac Hearse is more up-tempo, with bass, guitar and mandolin and it has a humour about the delivery of a baby and the car in question - a story told well. 25 Trees reminds me a little of Sam Baker with its description of location and literature. But overall, it’s Grimm’s show - with his well-observed and compassionate songs of family, friendship and fulfilment, providing the lynchpin for the album.
Family is important with Connor Grimm, Jackson Grimm, Jan Lucas-Grimm, all playing on the album, alongside the likes of guitarist Jason Wilber, Diederik van Wassenaer who adds violin and strings, to name but a couple of the other fine plates featured here. Susan Lindfors Taylor adds harmony vocals on his take on Eric Taylor’s Joseph Cross. It is an astute and sympathetic story of a Native American boy raised on a mission and under pressure to move away from his culture. Gone is a tribute, in part, to John Prine and his being gone though “there’s hope in knowing everywhere some people know the words” to his songs. It is the song that has the added touchstone of Jason Wilber’s contribution. Grimm also praises his lost contemporaries Michael Smith, Eric Taylor and David Olney in Dreaming Of King Lear, all of whom are company he could easily sit and share songs with. Coming full circle, the album closes with a reprise of the opening track A Dream. It seems to complete the circle to takes back the basic beauty that can exist alongside the more iniquitous times that we live through.
This is folk music pure and simple. It doesn’t need a prefix to allow it to be something else. It is born of voice, guitar and imagination. Something that Tim Grimm has used to deliver his songs since his debut HEARTLAND at the end of the 90s. As an aside, Grimm visits Ireland regularly as a host and tour guide and likely his travels inform who he is. The album deals, at times, with those who are gone but Grimm is definitely with us here and now.
Review by Stephen Rapid
Nathan Bell Red, White And American Blues Need To Know
There’s no doubting that Bell’s concerns here relate to the state of his nation, his own state of mind and a declaration he needed to make. The songs were written, in the main, in 2019 and things have not got much better since then. The subtitle of the album “It Couldn’t Happen Here” is a reference to novel by Sinclair Lewis from 1935, which posited the theory that American could become in thrall to fascism. Reality bites. The songs written at the time of the impeachment of a President include American Gun, American Blues, Wrong Man For The Job, songs that make a direct reference to troubled times. Other songs here include Retread Cadillac, his tribute to Lightin’ Hopkins. While he reflects on family ties and some of the good things that can transpire in A Lucky Man, he reflects on having “ a pocket full of dreams, but I tossed them all / had a few good friends until I lost them all.”
Throughout, Bell sings with conviction though mixed with the experience of doubt. He has a voice that you can believe in. Musically there is, not unnaturally, a larger slice of a blues folk axis to the sound, built around a solid rhythm section (Alvino Bennett and Frank Swart). The keyboards are from John Deaderick, while Reverend Crow values the harmonica. Bell handles the main guitar duties as well as vocals. His is ably joined on the album for some songs by the distinctive voices of Regina McCrary, Patty Griffin and Aubrie Sellers. All are artists themselves who know a good song when they hear it.
Running On The Razor holds nothing back on its depiction of those living off the grid and doing as much damage to themselves as they did to those they picked on. They “thought that it was funny / that they lived outside the law / and did it on government money.” In three lines Bell says a lot about what life can be for a segment of society that has fallen through the cracks. Zensuit’s Samadhi Blues and Monday Monday have the blues running though them, with wah-wah guitar and gospel grabbing keyboards.
Too Each Of Us (A Shadow) is a simpler evocation of love amidst a certain desperation. Effective in its simplicity of delivery, it conveys the raw emotion of need. Folding Money closes out the album and Bell adjusts his voice to suit the song, which is built over a restrained, effective backing that heightens the mood of uncertainty. Brian Brinkerhoff and Frank Swart’s production heightens the sense of unease, while giving the sound a sturdiness that feeds in to the intensity of these songs. This is something that continues to happen, then and now.
Review by Stephen Rapid
John Wort Hannam Long Haul Black Hen
The John Wort Hannam pictured on this album cover looks like a man who might have some life experiences to impart. That indeed is the case on LONG HAUL, wherein, over several songs, he states that he is taking a look at the bigger picture and what it shows us. Produced by Canadian roots music stalwart Steve Dawson, it has a warm, aged but not always rosy view of live, love and the pursuit of happiness (or something that might pass for that). The title track is the introductory affirmation of his stance taken, obviously, in later life, that it is now not “all about the chase / not the finish line / but babe that ain’t the case / no not this time.” There is also a lot of love expressed throughout in such songs as Wonderful Things, as well as the opposite side of the coin in Beautiful Mess, where the spoils of a relationship are divided “keep the Lou Reed record and the god-damn cat,” while acknowledging that they had loved each other with their beautiful mess.
Old Friend is a testament to the life of a long-time friend and partner in crime, what they got up to and how the memories are both sad and good. Hurry Up Kid is about waiting for a birth to happen “hurry up kid … I quit smoking … your Mama is showing / boy she’s glowing.” Hannam is an observer in the wings for these, essentially, small town vignettes of how we all deal with the cards dealt to us. In this case without bitterness but rather with to learn. Meat Draw is about a “small town legion Friday night meat draw” that has the observation that can only come from being there,“there’s an old gal in the corner / showing off her legs / but the old boys just ignore her / they came for bacon and eggs.” There are a couple of solid country moments in here that fit in the overall scheme with the pedal steel on Beautiful Mess and Young At Heart. The former a delightful duet with Keri Latimer. Elsewhere the folk/roots axis of the songs are perfectly delivered by the producer and players, including the contributions of multi-instrumentalists Fats Kaplin, keyboardist Chris Gestrin and Dawson own multi-guitar skills. They all bring enough variation to the tracks in that they never seem samey but rather mines a richer seam of Canadian life.
However, obviously, all this requires the focal point of Hannam’s rich wordsmithing and his aged, warm vocals. It fits and feels like a pair of well worn and loved jeans. Perhaps the title and the sentiment expressed in the closing song Young At Heart best sum up John Wort Hannam’s philosophy and outlook in say “may you die young at heart at a ripe old age.” There’s something of old wisdom in that saying. It’s a heartfelt and sincere wish that brings to close the latest album from the Lethbridge based performer who is undoubtedly in it for the long haul himself. Enjoy the journey.
Review by Stephen Rapid
Kashena Sampson Time Machine Self Release
The fortunes of Kashena Sampson had already hit a career low point prior to the pandemic. The tornado that hit East Nashville in March 2020 destroyed the iconic music venue The Basement East, cutting off her income stream and her means of financing her artistic career. With her bartending employment cut off overnight and the onset of Covid-19 soon afterwards, Sampson faced both financial and emotional ruin.
Her album TIME MACHINE had been recorded in February 2019, but with her financial stream severed, she had lost the means of funding its release. Thankfully her fortunes eventually improved, giving her the wherewithal to release the album.
Prior to relocating to Nashville in 2015, Sampson had spent a number of seasons on cruise ships, performing cover songs and eventually including some self-written songs in her repertoire. Encouraged by the positive feedback from her audience she bravely headed to Nashville, where she soon became a part of the burgeoning songwriting scene in East Nashville, alongside other like-minded female songwriters such as Erin Rae, Mary Bragg and Kyshona Armstrong. Co-writes with each of these artists feature on TIME MACHINE, as does a song written with her sister Jolana Sampson. Many of the recordings coming from that music community features material deeply personal and often harrowingly painful, and this album follows a similar theme.
The survival and struggles of artists, particularly those who may feel somewhat insecure, can have a devastating effect on the individual and Sampson confronts these issues head on. From The Outside considers the rollercoaster highs and lows of that chosen career, from the sold out shows to the financial burdens and isolation. Titles such as Alone And In Love Again and The Black Sea, recall dark times and dysfunctional relationships and they also showcase Sampson’s remarkable vocal range. The latter features a powerful, almost operatic, vocal performance, the former a breezy country folk presentation. It’s not all trouble and strife, the raunchy and full-blooded Whole Lot Better hints at a rebirth and while the title track recollects childhood innocence and rebellious adolescence, it also suggests a resilience and positivity going forward.
The production duties on TIME MACHINE were overseen by Jon Estes. The producer and multi-instrumentalist also added bass, piano, cello and organ, alongside guitarist Jeremy Fetzer, drummer Jon Radford. Jon Estes’ wife Elizabeth contributed strings.
An album that points to some deeply fervent soul searching by Sampson, you’re left with the impression of a cleansing and exorcism of darker times in the writer’s past and of acceptance and positivity going forward. On the strength of this most impressive recording, it’s no surprise that she is an integral part of that hugely talented group of female singer songwriters in the East Nashville musical community.
Review by Declan Culliton
Stuffy Shmitt More Stuff Happens Deluxe Edition Self Release
One of the my most played albums of the year, STUFF HAPPENS, from the idiosyncratic Stuffy Shmitt featured in our review section back in February of this year. It made an immediate impact, to say the least, with its stockpile of raging rockers alongside smooth ballads, which found the author digging into the memory vaults and recalling incidents and characters from his explosive past.
Settled and reinvigorated in East Nashville, following a near self-destructive existence in New York, Stuffy hooked up with producer Brett Ryan Stewart and multi-instrumentalist Chris Tench to record the album at Stewart’s studio in Franklin, Tennessee. What also followed were some striking videos to promote a number of the songs, filmed by the talented husband and wife duo Ahana Kaye and Iraki Gabriel.
The deluxe edition features an additional four tracks alongside the eleven from the original recording. Three of them are re-recordings of It’s Ok, Scratchin’ At The Cat and Sleeping On The Wet Spot, while the fourth, Sunglasses, is a live recording. I have no intention of reviewing the album track by track here, readers can check out the review from 14th February. Suffice to say that the tracks, from the minimalist The Last Song to the fully blown It’s Ok and She’s Come Unglued sound every bit as vital as they did when I originally reviewed the album.
The purpose here is to remind people to check out what is one of best suites of songs I’ve come across this year and a masterclass in grungy Americana.
Review by Declan Culliton
Riddy Arman Self Titled La Honda
Growing up in rural Ohio and leaving that environment to work as a travelling ranch hand, Riddy Arman’s country and western music is every bit as authentic as her lifestyle. Signed to La Honda Records, she joins like minded label mates and storytellers Colter Wall and Vincent Neil Emerson. In common with both artists, her songs read like poetry and are heart on sleeve musical memoirs of past experiences.
With her exquisite articulation and her ability to expertly stretch syllables in her deliveries, she draws the listener into her musings from the word go. The album is a collection of brooding ballads, nine in total, and was recorded at Portland, Oregon’s Mississippi Studio. Producer Bronson Tew (Dom Flemons, Jimbo Mathus, Jerry Joseph) ensures that Arman’s vocals are always out front and enriched by some fine playing that never distracts from her storytelling.
Spirits, Angels, Or Lies tells of her father’s passing and while on his deathbed, his hallucination of a visit from Johnny Cash. It’s a striking opener to the album, with vocals that perfectly convey the message within the song. Equally evocative and vivid is Barbed Wire, which paints a picture of the often-lonesome existence of the ranch hand. That lifestyle is also echoed in the contemplative Herding Song and the heartbreak of a failed relationship is recounted on Half A Heart Keychain. She ramps it up a few notches on Too Late To Write A Love Song before bookending the album with only vocal and acoustic guitar on the soul-searching Problems Of My Own. Also featured is a cover of Kris Kristofferson’s Help Me Through The Night which, although in keeping with the thread of the album, lacks the punch and impact of the self-written material.
An artist new to me, Arman’s songs succeed with flying colours in lifting the veil on personal and often difficult issues close to her heart. They also reveal her commitment to the agrarian lifestyle, without attempting to glamorise it in any way. An extremely impressive debut recording from an artist that I’ll be following closely going forward.
Review by Declan Culliton
Kevin Daniel Been Here Before Self Release
This is a break up album that dwells upon the hurt and the pain that stays after two lovers have separated. It certainly seems to be based in personal experience and all twelve tracks revolve around this central theme of trying to move on but still being haunted by the memories of both pleasure and pain. Kevin Daniel sings with a bluesy vocal tone that adds real authenticity to these songs of love and loss. It’s roots-based Americana with blues-tinged ballads and steamy rockers, sitting alongside a few numbers that reflect a Country leaning.
Two separate studios were used during the recording process with Jonathon Clayton (guitar), Steve Olonsky (keyboards), Keith Harry (bass) and Logan Jayne (drums) playing on six tracks, recorded at Echo Mountain Studios in Asheville, North Carolina. Separately, Jon Ledeau (guitar), Billy Pearson (bass), Renee Hikari (drums) and Brian Mitchell (keyboards) appear on four songs, recorded in Brooklyn, NYC.
Both ensembles play really well together and there is no sense of separation from the overall soulful feel of the album... Daniel produced the entire project, with some help on individual songs and there are contributions from other guests who either sing or play on various tracks. The vocal talents of Ashlee Joy Hardee, Margo Valientie and Sean Walsh appear, either on co-vocals or harmony and they enrich the sound with their talents.
The first two tracks jump out in real style, with Single In the Centre showing the bluesy side to Daniel as he laments his cheating lover and Don’t See the Light bringing a more rock-based attack with some nice keyboard and guitar breaks. The soulful element to Daniel’s vocals highlights the pain in knowing that your lover is gone. Lovemares is a vocal interlude of less than one minute, with the acapella voices sharing the frustration and fear of not being able to sleep with memories flooding every waking moment in the dark. Later on, there is a further song, Lovemares Part II, which arrives as a fully-fledged country song with Daniel feeling still haunted by the separation and not sleeping. The terrific pedal steel playing of Neal Rosenthall is a real highlight. Horizons is another country song with Daniel again feeling lost and lonely, ‘Life Is change and change is suffering, Spreading love is the only way to grow.’ Margo Valiente on harmony vocals, with Erica Mancini on accordion colouring the arrangement.
One Hand On the Bible is a rocky number that examines the dichotomy between wanting to live a good life and slipping into bad habits again. Guitar and keyboards lift the arrangement and Ashlee Joy Hardee joins Daniel on vocals to turn in a stellar performance. Sorrow Laden Song is similar with and easy blues groove and the warm keyboard sounds reflecting the difficulty that Daniel is having in moving on. Similarly, the final song, Dial Up Pain, is a bluesy tune that still sees the ache in separation and the bitterness at the cost and price of love.
Build It All is a folk song that Daniel delivers on acoustic guitar and vocals. It questions whether doing thing differently, with hindsight, would have made any difference. ‘Ain’t nothing in this world you cannot leave or lose, A life worth livings means a broken heart, Build it all to watch it fall apart.’
Me, No Myself and I, is a song that delivers an easy groove to both regret and sad memories while also looking at the good and bad sides of love. ‘Two people can never know each other till one is gone.’ A sentiment that is hard to agree with perhaps; or maybe it hides an unwanted truth? Daniel is heading back to North Carolina with a heavy heart.
It is a fine album in many ways. The playing and the production are excellent even if the subject matter doesn’t really change across the twelve tracks. After all, there is only so much heartache that a guy can take…!
Review by Paul McGee
Tekla Waterfield & Jeff Fielder Trouble In Time Self Release
Seattle based singer songwriter, Tekla Waterfield, has released this superbly crafted album of nine songs and the talent on display is very impressive indeed. The sound is very stripped back with plenty of space in the recording, which allows the music to linger and land gently on the senses.
Her husband, Jeff Fielder, produced the album and his multi-instrumentalist skills are very much to the fore. He has played with a number of renowned artists, including Mark Lanegan, Amy Ray and the Indigo Girls. Tekla plays guitar and sings lead vocals in a sweetly sensitive style with Jeff adding guitars, drums, bass and backing vocals on these understated and warm arrangements. The melodies are grounded by the subtle playing of Keith Lowe on five tracks, with upright bass and bowed bass setting the groove. The easy flow of Trouble In Time is a perfect example of the soulful delivery that Tekla delivers and the layered harmonies are quite superb. Equally, the gentle Better Days has a restrained tempo that gives room for the creative playing of Jeff to take flight around the melody.
No Justice, No Peace is a song that speaks against the inequality that society imposes on those of us who are born into a different skin or a separate ethnic group. Let There Be opens the album with a message of hope and a prayer sent out for future generations to make good all of the mistakes made by their forebearers. Again, some very creative guitar parts from Jeff and multi-tracked vocals to bring a sense of calm. Through the Falls has a slow, bluesy feel to the rhythm and the whispered vocals of Tekla are both intimate and wistful in the delivery.
In addition to creating her own music, Tekla also runs an entertainment and media public relations business that helps fellow artists connect with a wider audience. Her company is called, For The Story Press, and I can only wish her success in her endeavours to bring quality music out into the light.
Tekla has two previous albums, THIS NIGHTLIFE IS WEARING ON ME (2015) and THE CURTAIN FALLS (2018). I look forward to discovering both of these and I recommend that you also take a dive into this entertaining and enriching music.
Review by Paul McGee