Gwil Owen The Road To The Sky CRS
Perhaps something of an under-rated songwriter, Owen has never lacked the songs and is perhaps best known for a couple of songs that were covered by other artists such as Allison Moorer (with whom he wrote the nominated A Soft Place To Fall). Another co-write, this time with Kevin Gordon, Deuce And A Quarter, was recorded by Levon Helm and Keith Richards. He has written material that had been recorded by many other artists, however here it is Owen and his new songs that are the focus.
Owen released a number of fine album under his own name (and others with an earlier band) and has now returned with this self-produced set, where he blends his customary Americana blend of rock, country and a little loose funk. His comrades here include longtime John Prine bassist, Dave Jacques, who is joined in the rhythm section by another veteran player in Bryan Owings. The core players are completed by Joe McMahan on guitars and vocals and Tony Crow on keyboards.
The credits also reveal that this album has the inclusion of a guitar coda from the late David Olney in She Does It All With Her Eyes - a song that he co-wrote with Olney, as he also did with So Much. Will Kimbrough also was a co-writer for Where The West Wind Blows and Change. The remaining eight songs are from Owen’s own hand.
All of these reveal a sense of craftsmanship that can be poetic, full of charisma, alongside clarity and cinematic lyricism. Not that the songs lack punch, as with the solid guitar driven grit of Ghost Town (a song which features fellow songwriter and previous band mate Jeff Finlin) or the reflection of the meaning within the words of When The Songwriter’s Gone. Both are songs that would have an appeal to fans of The Boss. The simplicity, balanced with the occasional complexity, of the arrangements mean that the album has a variety of tonality that offers much to the listener. Throughout there is a groove, from the funkified rhythm of Connected to an equally soulful You Leaning On Me, which features vocals from Shannon McNally, who also adds her voice to three other tracks.
Magic Child is graced by a subtle and elevated gentleness, both in the structure as well as the lyric. Where The West Wind Blows also communicates a delicate touch regarding the wish for burial in a place of meditation as it slowly builds to a layered finish. Heaven In Our Hands sits alongside both as a strong spiritual piano led piece. All show the depth of Owen’s voice as a key part of the process.
That Gwil Owen is not better known is perhaps down to several external factors - though they are not related to the quality of his work. Something that those who have discovered his recordings will already know. This album continues that path and should be listened to.
Review by Stephen Rapid
Daniel Meade An Essentially Non Essential Compilation Of Recordings From The Last Ten Years (2013-22) From The Top
Possibly the best introduction to the music of Glasgow’s Daniel Meade. This is a 21 track compilation with tracks taken from his varied career. Glasgowcana might be a cheeky made-up label as this talented musician has, through the years, released albums that have covered a number of bases from roots to rock. While he has played keyboards with a number of artists including, alongside his brother Raymond, in Ocean Colour Scene and with Gerry Cinnamon. His own releases he is often the sole players on a number of these recordings. It should also be noted that he is no slouch in the composing stakes either and he is also a demonstrative singer.
This is Meade selection of songs that go back to some of his earliest releases. The choices are not chronological but rather fit together in the context of the pacing and tone of this compilation. Juliette is the earliest recording. It was written in a taxi after a gig and recorded with the Basement Boogie Men in a house in Paisley and produced by Meade and George Miller of The Kaisers (amongst others).
From there there are tracks recorded with Morgan Jahning (Old Crow Medicine Show) in 2015. Keep Right Away has Joshua Hedley fiddle as a centrepiece. From that same session, recorded in Hendersonville in Tennessee comes Not My Heart Again. Otherwise Meade has produced the majority of the material himself, often at home and often solo. But he has also had a long-standing relationship with trusted guitarist Lloyd Reid with whom he has appeared as a duo and also as a member of his band The Flying Mules. Cocaine Jane is a good example of how well they work together.
Some of these songs were written as love songs such a Shooting Stars And Tiny Tears. While he is equally adept at damning self-recrimination and noting how often he came close to the bottom rung of the ladder, either through alcohol or life’s unflinching kickings. In this category there’s Life At The Bottom, When Was The Last Time, Mother Of Mercy. Other songs were written in recovery or in realisation of the need to change like On The Line or As Good As It Gets.
As well as cover the ground in a honest look inwards the music looks outward and, in that light, offers a number of different (often very) musical settings that still manage to have a cohesiveness that makes the albums journey an interesting and effective one that is held together because it’s all Meade in his many moods and element of humour is often present alongside the healthy does of reality.
This is something of a holding pattern until the next new music comes along to take us on the next part of his passage through life’s rich tapestry. However one you consider that these 21 tracks are just a small selection of the music Meade has recorded to date you are again reminded of his underrated talent. And of the many albums that these songs are taken from all are well worth a listen and a visit to his Bandcamp for further details.
Review by Stephen Rapid
Karen Jonas The Restless Self Release
This marks a step up for Jonas, even if it is, in many ways, a step away from her previous albums which leaned more towards country influenced Americana. This album has a deep sense of longing and a darker tone than the earlier albums, but runs deeper into the heart of vulnerability and vitality. The title sums up a certain overall mood that allows a series of songs to tell a story, or an aspect of a story, and allows the listener to assimilate the overall mood of heartbreak, tempered with desire and longing but not allowing oneself to be seen as a victim. They are not judgemental, but rather lay out a series of observations that have the ring of truth, if not any definite answers.
The album was recorded in a studio in Virginia with Jonas’s long-time guitarist and musical partner, Tim Bray. They were joined by bassist Seth Morrissey, who also co-produced, and Jay Starling, playing a range of instruments. This resulted in a more layered and, by its process, a more organic sound. It also allowed time to consider the way that the songs and sound would be brought to life. It was a process of Jonas working with her friend and co-writer Andie Burke on the lyrical content, and then with Morrissey to find the best way to bring the music that point.
There are 10 songs here (with an acoustic version of one song added as a bonus closing track) that start with Paris Breeze, that celebrates a relationship and that city and all it has to offer. It sets a tone that is both intimate and introspective. Many of the songs have a literate and somewhat chimeric quality that allows the listener to discover something new in the songs, with repeated listening.
But there are also songs that have a more immediate impact, and they will vary with each listener. I was drawn to Elegantly Wasted, That’s Not My Dream Couch (which has a gauze-like affinity with early country music, in its guitar motif that is very appealing). And Rock The Boat which opens slowly with a treated vocal before the electric guitar adds a more sinister tonality that is most effective. It also highlights the added strength of Jonas’ vital vocal adeptness that is apparent throughout.
Deep in the glow of midnight moonlight is We Could Be Lovers, which has an overall soothing sensuality that offers a wealth of possibility in that moment - the use of the dobro adds to that feel. Another song that has a similar ambience, with the dobro and electric guitar working together as the key instruments, is the final track before that bonus cut and that is Throw Me To The Wolves. It has a sense of rejection but also a determination to survive and thrive. The acoustic version of Lay Me Down is then a perfect follow on from those two previous tracks and is as strong, if not more so, than the full band version found in the first part of the album’s running order.
This is an album that accentuates the talent that Jonas and her collaborators have brought to THE RESTLESS, and places her front and centre of a wave of female singer/songwriters who are not following trends but are leading them in a very individual and galvanising way.
Review by Stephen Rapid
Jesse Jennings The Last Dance Legend
Hardwood floor Texas country that would surely have them up dancing, as they indeed do in those parts. There’s no information accompanying this download in terms of production or player credits (though based on his previous release, it’s likely that he wrote and produced this album himself). Given that, all involved seem to have had a good time making it. Formerly a member of the Casey Donahew Band, Jennings lists the likes of Waylon Jennings, Garth Brooks and Bob Seger as major influences and that shows through in a number of the tracks on this 8 track album. There are elements of the rocker guitar on the opening Beer Joint, where Jennings lets us know that his mother has found the right kind of lady for him, but he prefers to find his women in the establishment of the title.
I’m sure Jennings had a hand in the writing of these songs but, again, that’s not detailed. So what we are left with is the music as it is offered, and it is a satisfying example of the many artists who play around in the State. In this case he is currently based in Fort Worth (and, coincidently for a website from Dublin, Ireland was originally from Dublin, Texas). The title track has some fine fiddle that fits this failing relationship song well. A little more rocky is This Is My Goodbye, another song that is based on a parting of the ways.
Pat Green is something of a Texas country legend and this song named after him details his presence in a time that brings around some mixed memories, with the named musician appearing on the radio during a pleasant summertime. Moonshine is again about time, place and backroads associations and illicit alcohol delivery. That omnipresent liquid is also the subject of Whiskey and its ramifications on a couple, one of whom “can’t do this anymore” despite her “loving you till my dying day.” It paints a fairly common country music scenario of hardship and break-up. The song has a sense of pain that is palatable. It shows Jennings’ vocal ability well and is an album stand-out.
Perhaps the best track here is the final one, Driving In, which features Dave Perez on accordion, giving it a nice border feel that immediately draws attention to it. It has a strong chorus and a beat that is kind of infectious and should be a live favourite.
While Jennings is not doing something that is a whole lot different from many of his contemporaries, this shows that he is an emerging talent. His debut came out in 2014, so we can expect his next outing will show a progression from that release and his development as a singer and writer as this likely won’t be his last dance.
Review by Stephen Rapid
Jaimee Harris Boomerang Town Thirty Tigers
If RED RESCUE, released by Jaimee Harris in 2020, provided a snapshot of the potential of the Texan singer songwriter, her sophomore recording BOOMERANG TOWN reveals an artist that has blossomed and matured enormously over those few short years. The loss of close ones, followed by the pandemic, has resulted in Harris looking over her shoulder at life’s fragility, the clutches of addiction both personal and further afield, and family complexities.
Her partnership with Mary Gauthier has, no doubt, instilled a noticeable self-confidence and inner strength in Harris. Their weekly live streams during lockdown found Harris growing in confidence as the weeks went by and, fuelled by Gauthier’s support, delivering self-written songs that often matched the excellence of Gauthier’s material. That shyness and hesitancy have well and truly been left behind on the ten tracks on BOOMERANG TOWN which, although not entirely autobiographical, focuses on issues and characters that have no doubt been at the forefront of the writer’s mind for some time.
The opener and title track tells of a young couple, whose dreams to create lives for themselves outside the confines of their small town and not follow their families’ traditions, fall by the wayside when the woman gets pregnant. (‘Julie and I come from similar kin, heavy drinkers, quick to anger, fists to skin. They all live and die here’). A former young school friend of Harris, who was tragically accidentally shot and killed, is remembered in the co-write with Mary Gauthier, Fall (Devin’s Song). Another co-write with Gauthier also features, the beautiful How Could You Be Gone. A stand-out track, it was included in Gauthier’s last record DARK ENOUGH TO SEE THE STARS and Harris’ rendition, enriched by delightful viola and violin by David Mansfield, matches the excellence of the previous version.
The Fair and Dark Haired Lad celebrates the writer’s ongoing sobriety and recovery from alcohol abuse (‘I say goodbye, tip my hat, to the fair and dark haired lad’). It’s an upbeat and uplifting admission and features Dirk Powell on accordion and Michele Gazich on violin. The concerns and uncertainty that raise their heads in the early stage of a relationship are addressed in the acoustic ballad Good Morning My Love before the album is bookended with the assured Missing Someone. It’s a rhythmic final statement, with Harris rejoicing in her new-found relationship and serenity.
An album that is often directed towards self-examination, BOOMERANG TOWN’S textured stories reveal a singer songwriter with the ability to express both anguish and fulfilment in her writing. A hugely impressive album from start to finish.
Review by Declan Culliton
The Nude Party Rides On New West
Released in late 2020, MIDNIGHT MANOR was the second album released by the New York via North Carolina sextet, The Nude Party. Having previously supported high-profile names like Jack White, The Arctic Monkeys and Dr. Dog, the album hit the number one spot on the Alternative New Artists Album Chart and was destined to further elevate their exposure and fan base. However, the opportunity to tour the album was scuppered by the pandemic, which also denied them the stage time to road-test material they were in the process of writing for their third full-length album.
Rather than lick their wounds and feel sorry for themselves, the band pooled their resources and took the bold decision to create their own studio to rehearse and record in. Converting a barn in upstate New York into a working studio was a project that they undertook over a twelve-month period. To fit out the studio they teamed up with engineer Matthew Horner, who transported his recording equipment to the newly built space and subsequently engineered the band’s first self-produced album, RIDES ON. Not working against a deadline and with the luxury of their own rehearsal and recording facility has resulted in their most robust record to date.
The Nude Party’s heart and soul have always been rooted in a retro 60s and early 70s vibe and they don’t stray too far from that benchmark with RIDES ON. Echoes of The Stones’ albums STICKY FINGERS and EXILE ON MAIN STREET are close to the surface on Word Gets Around, Polly Anne and the Dr. John cover, Somebody Tryin To Voodoo Me. The zippy Ride On could have been plucked from The Velvet Underground songbook and they dip their toes into the country sound of their home state of North Carolina on Tree Of Love. They fashion a fusion of roots and folk on Midnight On Lafayette Park, inviting comparisons with their Catskills neighbours,The Felice Brothers. Others that impress are Hey Monet, which has a 60s dance anthem sound, and the soulful Sold Out Of Love.
Five years since the release of their debut self-titled album, The Nude Party’s self-assured and loose garage band sound remains very much to the fore on RIDES ON. You’re left with the impression that is exactly where they want to be musically and they more than achieve that with this fitting heir to its predecessor MIDNIGHT MANOR.
Review by Declan Culliton
Logan Springer & The Wonderfully Wild Crow Self Release
A few lines into All Lies, the opening track on CROW, and you’re left in little doubt about where the writer is coming from. ‘There’s poison in our drinking water says the man on TV… It’s hard to trust someone who’s never felt hunger, hard to believe he can feel the abuse,’ Springer spits out, mirroring the sentiment of mistrust, anxiety and abandonment felt by much of his blue-collar community in the Midwestern States of America. It’s the first track on the ten-track record by Logan Springer & The Wonderfully Wild. Springer released his debut solo album in 2021 titled COYOTE and with an extended band recorded CROW at Flat Back, a one-hundred-year-old converted barn in rural Iowa.
Plans to escape the dead-end life of working in a strip mine for little pay, by robbing the mine’s bank, surface on the driving rocker Greenbacks and Gold. There’s little to rejoice about in the piano-driven Headed Through Hell either, the story of a long-distance truck driver. Constantly on the road, in remission from pill addiction, divorced from his wife and without any contact with his children, he wishes he could turn back the clock and start all over again. ‘Crow on the telephone line, watching every move I make, crow on the telephone line, this paranoia I can’t shake,’ bellows Springer on the full-blown, grungy and dark-as-hell title track. It points at mental illness and/or the impossibility to circumvent an existence that offers little by way of optimism. There’s little by way of good cheer either on Thundercloud. A raging guitar led song with a nod in the direction of Neil Young and Crazy Horse, it’s one of many highlights on the ten tracks that feature.
Coming from a large extended farming family in a small town in central Illinois, Springer’s ambitions extended beyond following the back-breaking prospect of long working days on the farm. That lifestyle and the expectation to ‘just get on with it’, is squarely articulated in Can’t Complain.
‘Your typical country song is like the social media of music; it only shows the good parts. I want to show what life out in the middle is really like, without all of the polish,’ explains Springer on the motivational force that brought CROWS into being. He makes his point with flying colours on an album that hardly allows the listener to draw breath and, for maximum impact, should be checked out at very high volume and from start to finish.
Review by Declan Culliton
Paul McCann Alter Ego Self Release
Co-produced by Paul McCann and Martin Quinn, ALTER EGO is the second full- length album from the Cavan, Ireland native. It follows on from McCann’s debut album HERE COMES THE RAPTURE from 2018 and two previously released EPs, THE MAGICIAN and BEGINNING TO END.
The initial recording sessions for ALTER EGO took place in 2019 at Jam Studios in Kells, Co. Meath, but the arrival of Covid both delayed the completion of the album and also led to a number of the recordings being carried out remotely. The result was a delay of two years in the release of the album and that interruption allowed McCann to engage a number of guest musicians who otherwise would most likely have been out on the road with their various bands. Rather than playing the majority of the instruments himself as he had done on previous albums, McCann called on the services of Gary Lucas (Jeff Buckley, Captain Beefheart), Charlotte Hatherley (Ash, Bash For Lashes), Roger Joseph Manning Jr. (Beck, Jellyfish, Air) and Jason Falkner (St. Vincent, Beck, Paul McCartney). Others featured are McCann’s regular ‘go to’ artists Majella O’Reilly, Brendan Scott and Tony Smith. McCann’s two young daughters Lily and Cassie are also credited as backing vocalists.
The songs were created during a challenging time for McCann as he grieved the sudden passing of his father in 2019, following an accident, and his frame of mind at that time is reflected on a number of the tracks. Graceful arrangements and gorgeous harmonies enhance Love Is All That Matters, with the writer laying bare his emotions. Equally close to home in its sentiment is All Is Fair In Love And War and World Keeps Turning Around recalls The Byrds at their most experimental. The heat is turned up a few notches and enters Teenage Fanclub territory on the power poppy Lost In This Moment. Call Off The Dogs and Divide And Conquer are in a similar toe- tapping fashion before the album is bookended with the trippy Weight Of The Bow.
McCann’s influences range from Johnny Cash - he was a member of the Johnny Cash tribute band Get Rhythm that in 2013 spent four months touring Irish prisons - to Jeff Buckley and The Beatles to Nick Drake. The resulting twelve tracks on this album mirror those role models of McCann and offer a compelling blend of classic power pop, harmony-drenched roots and considered ballads.
ALTER EGO is a reminder that we don’t always have to look beyond our own shores to uncover quality music. It’s a record packed with instantly catchy tunes, providing an insight into an unquestionable local talent.
Review by Declan Culliton
Channing Wilson Dead Man Ol’Dog/Soundly
Readers may be more familiar with songs written by Channing Wilson than ones actually recorded by the Lafayette, GA artist. With a few recordings under his belt including a self-titled release from 2012 and a live album titled LIVE AT EDDIE’S ATTIC in 2017, his primary occupation for the past two decades has been songwriting. Luke Combs scored a No.1 hit with Wilson’s She Got The Best Of Me and others who recorded his material include Travis Tritt, Jerry Jeff Walker, Sunny Sweeney and The Oak Ridge Boys. Given his expertise in penning songs for others, it would not be unreasonable to expect his latest studio album, DEAD MAN, to contain formula-written material. However, nothing could be further from the truth. The ten tracks that make up the album contain hard-edged tales of excess, destitution and depression, and given the potency of the writing, give the impression, factual or not, that many of the scenes and characters are somewhat autobiographical.
Whether real or imagined, Wilson’s gritty baritone vocals are well suited to his topics. His songs are a reflection of real-life issues faced by many ordinary folks, and like famed country singers of yesteryear, Jimmy Rogers and Hank Williams, the material offers portraits of ordinary folk often on the margins.
Drink That Strong, which opens the album, paves the way for what is to follow. A ‘love lost’ lament, it has echoes of Jamey Johnson both in its message and vocal delivery. That theme of booze and rejection continues on the more mellow but equally sorrowful Beer For Breakfast. Similarly paced and maintaining the ‘sad country song’ thrust, Sunday Morning Blues is a classic ballad, all the better for some well-placed aching pedal steel guitar. ‘Well, Lord there is nothing as lonesome as hearing your heart beat all alone,’ Wilson sings on the mournful ballad Blues Comin’ On before he touches on the grinding reality of finally falling off the edge on Dead Man Walking.
Far from a party album, DEAD MAN is hard-hitting, plain-spoken and forthright, from an artist that more than qualifies as a modern outlaw. Produced by Grammy winner Dave Cobb and with a host of celebrated players contributing, it’s a record loaded with memorable and well-crafted songs. The characters that populate the songs may be fictional or closer to home, either way, their burdens and tribulations are communicated flawlessly on this hugely impressive record.
Review by Declan Culliton