Melissa Carper Ramblin’ Soul Thirty Tigers
Texan singer-songwriter and upright bass impresario, Melissa Carper, most certainly cannot be accused of inactivity. A member of two bands, Sad Daddy and Buffalo Gals, she also enjoys a solo career, together with regularly performing with Brennen Leigh and Kelly Willis, trading songs on stage as a trio. She is also no stranger to the studio and her latest project, RAMBLIN’ SOUL, follows hot on the heels of her 2021 release DADDY’S COUNTRY GOLD.
The title of her latest album reflects the post-Covid freedom as Carper reflects on getting back to doing what is closest to her heart - travelling, meeting up with like-minded friends and performing to live audiences. Though not straying too far from the formula of her last recording, RAMBLIN’ SOUL finds her in a somewhat more upbeat mood, with thirteen tracks that breeze between old-timey, jazz-infused swing and country.
From the autobiographical opener to the Brennen Leigh cover, Hanging On To You, which bookends the album, Carper treats the listener to a stockpile of songs that truly captures the shifting colours of country and roots music over the past six decades. The return to touring and playing to live audiences may have been the catalyst for the album but, interestingly, a number of the songs had been written or part written over the past decade and earlier, which is an indication in itself of Carper’s proficiency as a songwriter. The touching soulful ballad Ain’t A Day Goes By recalls the passing of her parents within a year of each other, her brother’s struggles with mental health issues, and losing her beloved dog, Betty. The more recently written song, That’s My Only Regret, is a fine country shuffle and she forays into gospel folk with the Odetta-written Hit or Miss. Following on from the song My Old Chevy Van which featured on DADDY’S GOLD, she continues to pay homage to the motors that faithfully transported her on her musical touring travels with 1980 Dodge Van. Boxers On Backwards is laced with wicked humour and a reminder that fortune often does favour the brave.
Sticking with the same production team of Andrija Tokic and Dennis Crouch, who worked with her on DADDY’S COUNTRY GOLD, the credits read like a ‘who’s who’ of some of the most respected players in Nashville. Crouch played bass, and guitars and pedal steel were by Chris Scruggs. Also featured are John Pahmer (organ and piano), Matty Meyer (drums), Billy Contreras (fiddle), Rory Hoffman (clarinet, piano, nylon string guitar), and Wes Langlois (guitars). Sierra Ferrell and Larry Marrs provided harmony vocals, and backing vocals are credited to the trio of Kyshona Armstrong, Maureen Murphy and Nickie Conley.
A member of her family’s travelling band from a young age, Carper has remained steadfastly loyal to the music that inspired her over the years, refusing to modernise or remodel the purity of those genres so close to her heart. Unashamedly nostalgic, there is an undisputed quality and consistency throughout RAMBLIN’ SOUL, reaffirming that Melissa Carper is unlikely to ever radically shift in style. Amen to that.
Review by Declan Culliton
Rich Hopkins & Luminarios Exiled On Mabel Street Blue Rose
I have to admit that I’ve been a big fan of Rich Hopkins’ music since discovering his EL OUTRO LADO / THE OTHER SIDE album in 2010. It has been very much ‘business as usual’ with each subsequent album that Hopkins and his Luminarios have released since then. Thumping drums, soaring guitars, hoarse vocals – sometimes spoken, more often sung – songs that often exceed the five-minute mark on albums that approached one hour in duration, have all been the norm. Behind that formula are well-constructed and thoughtful songs, which often draw attention to the under privileged and unfortunate, and are seldom judgemental.
There has always been a glorious looseness about Hopkins’ music, which, despite his low profile, has earned him the accolade of ‘godfather of desert rock’. That unpretentiousness is repeated on EXILED ON MABEL STREET, creating the impression that Hopkins and his wife and co-writer Lisa Novak simply entered the studio with his latest Luminarios line up, cranked up the guitars and recorded live to tape.
Stand out songs Friend Of The Shooter from BURIED TREASURE (2012) and El Outro Lado / The Other Side (2010), from the aforementioned album of the same name, dealt with gun violence and immigration respectively, without ever attempting to sensationalise. His latest offering includes a similarly powerful track, Prodigal Son. A true story based on Hopkins’ encounter with an individual on the streets of Austin, Texas, it addresses mental illness and homelessness (‘The blanket I gave him can’t cover his mistakes’). Taking the album title from a street in Tucson, Arizona, close to where Hopkins resides, a jangly guitar introduces the opening track A Message Of Hope, with the writer recounting fatherly advice advocating forgiveness and tolerance. High-pitched feedback surrounds Novak as she takes the lead vocal on the chilling track Break Through. Other selections of note are Hopkins’ ode to his estranged biological mother Josephine and the confessional I Wouldn’t Listen to Me, before he signs off with Bataan Death March. An instrumental track recalling the horrendous treatment of prisoners of war by the Japanese army in 1942, it bookends the album on a powerful note, with a backing track of marching boots and a Hopkins recital of The Lord’s Prayer adding intensity to the elegy.
‘Some say I’m like an old dog, but I can learn new tricks,’ claims Hopkins on Count On Me, a love song dedicated to Novak. On the strength of this album and his back catalogue, Hopkins is doing just fine digging into his memory vaults and consistently delivering records packed with grungy energy.
Review by Declan Culliton
The Great Divide Providence Self Release
When we reviewed Mike McClure’s ninth solo recording, LOOKING UP, back in 2020, we hardly envisaged that he would be hooking up once more with his former band colleagues in The Great Divide. Parting ways back in 2003 - McClure freely admits that his appetite for booze and drugs was a major contributing factor - the band left behind a legacy as one of the most influential bands on the Red Dirt music scene of the time, with five cracking albums while McClure was on board. He was replaced by singer Micah Aills after his departure, but the band disbanded in 2005 after the release of their album UNDER YOUR OWN SUN that year.
Older, wiser and with McClure in an altogether better place (‘I have a new lens of sobriety to look through, and I’m coming from a place of healing, forgiveness and rebirth’), PROVIDENCE finds the band in fine form and certainly matching the quality of their early work. The songwriting often chronicles McClure’s memories since leaving the band back in 2003 and up to the present. The album opens with Wrong Is Overrated, which reads like a confession or admission of guilt by McClure for his part in breaking ties with the band. With a Son Volt/Byrds vibe’ it’s a standout track and confirmation of the collective prowess of the band.
It’s not all foot fully on the gas either, I Can Breathe Again, which follows, is a splendid love song that channels rebirth and rejuvenation and the reggae tinged Slippin’ Away recognises the passing of time and the value of living in the moment. There are many other high points worth noting, particularly My Sweet Lily and Infinite Line. The former is a heartfelt ode to a loved one and the latter is a full-on Rolling Stones sounding belter.
It may be the best part of two decades since McClure’s departure, but his return signals ‘business as usual.’ Alongside original members Kelley Green (bass), Scotte Lester (rhythm guitar), his brother JJ Lester (drums) and newer recruit Bruce Conway (keyboards), McClure and his bandmates don’t stray far from their comfort zone with an unflinchingly honest and often powerful suite of songs.
Review by Declan Culliton
Jeffrey Halford And The Healers Soul Crusade CRS
There is a lot happening in Jeffrey Halford’s latest album SOUL CRUSADE and despite my first impression from the record’s title, it is anything but restricted to the soul genre. Instead, the eleven tracks feature a crisscross between blues, roots, gospel, country and folk and soul, very much like a meeting of the musical outputs of Dr. John and Chuck Prophet.
Halford has been treading the boards for over three decades by now and his current partners in crime, Adam Rossi, Mike Anderson and Aaron Halford, are his backing band, The Healers. They are joined by a host of guest musicians on SOUL CRUSADE and collectively deliver an album loaded with intensity and fervour.
No doubt the aforementioned Mac Rebennack and Chuck Prophet would have been proud to include the funk-drenched tracks Pie Eyed Poet’s Plea and Take It Slow on any of their recordings. In contrast, Wandering Kind and Pescadero are less pacey roots-tinged efforts. The latter is a classic road song bringing to mind sun-drenched freewheeling trips along the Mexican border. The uplifting gospel anthem Walk To The River not only showcases the musicianship of Halford and his crew, but also the eloquent background vocals of Hannah Halford. The rampant bluesy rocker Devil has a mid-career Rolling Stones stamp to it and they sign off with Sad Sinking Feeling, with a nod in the direction of Neil Young’s Harvest Moon, bringing closure to an album that is easy to get totally immersed in after a couple of plays.
Review by Declan Culliton
Tobias Berblinger The Luckiest Hippie Alive Ten Dollar
This album was originally released in 2018 but is getting a new release as it has just been released in vinyl format and in a remastered CD/digital format. Berblinger is a musician and illustrator/designer with a love of the more cosmic side of California country, alongside an affinity for the Texas troubadours Guy Clark, Townes van Zandt and Blaze Foley. His original material falls between these two primary influences. Nor is he without a sense of humour as evidenced by the album title and songs such as My Boots Have Been Drinking, wherein he asks for forgiveness from the people and places the errant footwear took him to. A similar sense of unworthiness continues with the lively toe-tapping beat of Blade Of Grass, with some tasty guitar from Chris Cook.
There are three covers included in the ten tracks. The first of these is his take on the Commander Cody classic, Seeds And Stems (Again), a choice that suggests certain substances may be involved in the overall scheme of things! As with Drinking, and other tracks, it benefits from the harmony vocals of Mariya May. The title track pretty much sums up a tale of misadventure and a freewheeling attitude, wherein he wonders “I don’t know what I done right but the sun is shining on me.” The story is worth following to see how this streak of luck unfolds, again some tasty guitar is delivered.
There is that overriding feeling that these songs define a hippie lifestyle combined with some enjoyable country music, and some more considered folk outings like It Ain’t Right with flute and soft harmonies from Annie Perkins. However, we are back in the arms of the honky tonk for the hapless ‘drowning of one’s sorrows’ tale that is the self-explanatory Heartaches, Hard Times And Hard Drinking. Divisions continues with an acoustic guitar tendency that works, while the final two tracks are again covers with Crawl Back To You coming from the repertoire of the late and lamented Blaze Foley. It is here given a treatment that is admirably fitting with its source. The final song is a version of the equally revered Gene Clark’s Polly Come Home, which has again a blend of an underlying folk feel, emphasised by the flute which is sitting easily alongside the pedal steel and it has an appropriately impassioned vocal from Berblinger.
Mo Douglas produced the album alongside Berblinger and he also played acoustic guitar, lead guitar, bass and rhythm guitar on numerous tracks. The duo bring a varied and layered sound throughout that was bolstered by the contributions of the other musicians, who included Jesse Cunningham’s pedal steel contributions to half a dozen of the tracks.
Given the way the world has turned since the original release in 2018, it makes sense to place it again before a possible wider audience. It has an easy freewheeling feeling that should find favour with those looking for something that most definitely sits outside the mainstream. I doubt this is the last we will hear from Berblinger and one can hope he will continue to produce new music in this unfashionable fashion.
Review by Stephen Rapid
Luke LeBlanc Fugue State Self Release
Minnesota native Luke LeBlanc returns with his fourth album release, written during lockdown and reflecting on the state of things as he perceives them to be right now. If Covid brought any insights or lessons perhaps it was to look inwards in our search for answers, and to slow down the relentless rush of external commitments. There is a lingering feeling of time wasted in chasing some material illusion of happiness and success.
However, rather than finding ourselves in a fugue state, I like to think that more clarity has evolved from our scrambling in the dark and that a greater awareness has replaced the urge to look to others for our self validation. Have we lost our identity and our collective awareness? LeBlanc seems to think so and he attempts to make sense of his feelings around the current social challenges, post Covid.
Real Phonic Studio in Cleveland, Minnesota was the location for recording and from November 2021 to July 2022, the musicians focused their energies on developing the eleven songs included here. Produced and engineered by Erik Koskinen, who also plays electric guitar, bass, banjo, and keyboards, FUGUE STATE features John Cleve Richardson on keyboards and backing vocals, Ryan Young (Trampled by Turtles) on violin, Eric Heywood (Son Volt, Jayhawks) on pedal steel, Casey Frensz on saxophone and Erin Bekkers on drums.
Three of the players appeared on the previous album, ONLY HUMAN, and the contributions of Erin Bekkers, John Cleve Richardson and Erik Koskinen go a long way to creating the intimate sound of the recording and the bed rock upon which the other studio musicians can gel together. The interplay is superb throughout and the light production touch of Koskinen is very impressive. Certainly, a great advert for the approach of letting the quality of the song melodies breathe for themselves.
Maybe the outbreak of the Covid pandemic and the global economic recession that has ensued make us realise just how disconnected we have become despite our abundance of smartphones and social media. The isolation and loneliness felt by people during the last two years has left an indelible mark and on songs like When I Walk With You and Soothes Me we are reminded that personal connection and real communication are what remain as the cornerstones of collective recovery. LeBlanc displays a keen sense of trying to make it all seem worth the struggle.
The love song Now seems to be a reflection and understanding of parenting and the lessons learned in growing up. On the song Down Low there is a message that the process of slowing down brings its own reward, a theme that he also explores on tracks like Still, Walking Days and Take Your Mind Off It. Not allowing worry to cripple you is something that we can all try to practice in these times of change and the final track sums up the journey that LeBlanc has been on. Long Way To Go sings of the progress made and the challenge that still lies out ahead. With all these feelings of vulnerability I have the sense that LeBlanc is coming into his own and cruising along the fast lane to greater success.
Review by Paul McGee
Field Guide Field Guide Birthday Cake
Dylan MacDonald returns with a new album, his third release in the last two years. Field guide is his performing name and MacDonald has also released two Eps and a number of singles since 2019. This new release highlights a very self-assured musician, adept at penning reflective tunes that are wrapped in enticing melodies.
MacDonald has a richly toned vocal and the delivery is a mixture of just the right combination of wistful longing and knowing experience. These ten songs fall right into the basket of americana and roots sounds with the instrumentation delivering an impressive balance that enhances the arrangements. Recorded in a variety of locations and studios, the self-production of MacDonald is assured and uncluttered, giving the songs room to breath in the mix. The musicians that came together include the core trio of MacDonald (guitars, bass, vocals, Wurlitzer, B3, synths), Matt Kelly (pedal steel) and Olivier Fairfield (drums). They are joined on specific tracks by Tom Dobrzanski (Wurlitzer), Kris Ulrich (Moog) and Leif Vollebekk (bass).
The gentle strum of Goddess and Leave You Lonely typify the easy flow of the music that paints different colours on other tracks like Remember When and Worst Of Ways. The track In Love Now speaks of wanting to make a relationship work, ‘I wanna go through the days more slowly, I wanna talk to you more gently.’
Similarly, on You Could Be Free the message is one of ‘If I cannot give you what you need, Take all your things and be free.’ Past mistakes are referenced on For Sure and Cracked Open is another look at how a relationship can be framed. Worst Of Ways has a more up-tempo arrangement and it unfolds around a fine guitar motif and subtle drumming. Wishing Well gives thanks for all the positive things that populate MacDonald’s life, while the message in Looking Back refers to living in the moment and not getting stuck in the past. Based on this fine collection of songs, the career trajectory for FIELD GUIDE is only going in one direction – accelerating forward and at a steady pace.
Review by Paul McGee
StevieRay Latham Hinterland Self Release
This fine artist has been creating his music over the last decade and has released a series of EPs that reflect an ongoing maturity and burgeoning talent. On this latest EP we are treated to four songs and the gentle, reflective sounds come across as strongly representative of where Latham finds his creative muse right now. Written during a period at home in Devon, having contacted the Covid virus, the songs have a directness that makes for an enjoyable and interesting listen.
Latham kicks off the EP with the reflective Let Me Inside accompanied by acoustic and understated electric guitar. The song looks at the essence of relationships and what keeps us apart while wishing for the glue that can bind us together.
Old Friends opens with an acoustic guitar and builds into a fine arrangement that questions friendship and being open with the truth. Nice keyboards and understated percussion support the song dynamic and the image of loss hangs heavily as Latham brings his sad tale of missed communications to an inevitable conclusion.
Fugitive has a nice tempo and a melody that echoes the words of frustration, regret and worldly woes that are mirrored in the haunting keyboard parts. It hints at a relationship breakdown but could also mirror the inner thoughts of a self-critical mind.
No Way Out is the final song and has a sparse arrangement around a message of being trapped in a dilemma, whether mental or physical, brought on by negative feelings. It could be a post Brexit plea for greater inclusion as we move forward, but Latham comes across more as a dismayed musician who feels the weight of uninspired leadership and limited options.
As always, the music is both interesting and rewarding, giving the listener plenty to digest while enjoying the superb musicianship at play.
Review by Paul McGee
The Welcome Wagon Esther Asthmatic Kitty
This band is comprised of husband and wife duo, Vito and Monique Aiuto. He is a pastor at the Resurrection Presbyterian Church in Brooklyn, New York and Monique has worked as a preschool teacher. Together, they have been releasing music since their 2008 debut, produced by Sufjan Stevens and released on his Asthmatic Kitty label. This new release is album number four and sees the couple in perfect harmony, both in their enthralling vocal delivery and their focus upon spreading the word of the bible in their lyrics. The references to religion may be off putting to many but when the message is one of simple acceptance and caring for each other, then it transcends any specific dogma and transfers into a universal message. Love and belief in a better way of living are the fuel that drives us after all, no matter what religious persuasion you identify with.
The album title refers to the enduring influence of Monique’s grandmother, Esther. Her voice opens the project with readings from scripture on Isiah, California and she also makes an appearance on a further song, Matthew 7/7. The beautiful vocals and sweetly melodic song arrangements are all delivered with a style that lingers after the ten tracks have come and gone. Nothing ventures too far from the central theme of serving the song with a less is more discipline. Two songs stand out, with Knocking On the Door Of Love and Consolation Blues heightening the experience that is both captivating and charming. The spoken part in Noble Tree is wrapped in lush keyboard and guitar sounds and I Know You Know is a song that engages and takes the certainty of trusting in another as a comfort. In the absence of playing credits I can only offer a general round of applause for all involved. The musicians deliver with understated grace and the playing is superbly consistent.
Review by Paul McGee