May 22, 2022

Doug MacLeod - The Utrecht Sessions (2008)

"Never play a note you don't believe"
His name sounds like one of an antique Scottish Highlander but he rather looks like an old seaman with a tanned face carved by the sun, salt and winds of the ocean. Born in 1946 in New York, he grew up in St. Louis where he started to play guitar. Affected by a bad stutter, probably caused by child abuse, he discovered that singing helped him to overcome his handicap. So he started to sing too. He later joined the Navy, stationed in Norfolk, Virginia. On one of his off-duty time, he met a one-eyed country bluesman from Toano (Virginia) named Ernest Banks who taught him two principles that guided his life as a musician : "Never play a note you don't believe" and "Never write or sing about what you don't know about."

With George "Harmonica" Smith
Once discharged from the Navy, he moved to Los Angeles, where he met his second mentor and close friend George "Harmonica" Smith, and played with legendary bluesmen Big Joe Turner, Pee Wee Crayton, Eddie "Cleanhead" Vinson, Lowell Fulson, Big Mama Thornton... He later relocated in Memphis where he now resides.

An extremely talented song-writer, or more properly a master story-teller in the original tradition of the blues, MacLeod has written over 300 original songs so far, among which many have been covered by numerous blues greats (Albert King, Albert Collins, Son Seals, Tabby Thomas, Joe Louis Walker, Coco Montoya, James Armstrong, Chris Thomas King, Billy Lee Riley…), and has put out an impressive discography of some forty studio & live albums since his first one in 1984. He also won a no less impressive list of music awards. As if it wasn't enough, he also co-wrote with Debra B. Schiff a mystery novel, "Murder At The Crossroads: A Blues Mystery", which came out in March 2022.

With this album uniquely composed of original songs, and recorded in Holland, a country he seems to cherish, MacLeod continues to take us back to the inter-war era of country blues when the songsters used to sing tales mixing symbolic stories and real life experiences. These twelve tracks are all magnificent and MacLeod's chiseled lyrics are full of popular rural poetry.

Two closely linked themes,  the flying of time and death, stand out  in tracks like "Horse With No Rider", the sorrowful "This Old River" with its "Midnight Special" gospel twist, the "The Long Black Train" boogie (a new version of the song released on his very first album "No Road Back Home"), the dark "The Demon's Moan", "Long Time Road" or the soul complaint "I Respectfully Decline".
The torments of love, a classic blues topic, also appear in the stomping "The Addition To Blues", the excellent out-standing folk "That Ain't Right", the swinging "Coming Your Brand New Day" and the heavily strummed "What You Got (Ain't Necessarily What You Own)". "Sheep Of A Different Color" is a protest-song in the 1960s style, while   "Where You'll Find Me" has a biblical twist a la Dylan.

His very rhythmical and highly skilled acoustic steel guitar finger-picking and slide style and his stomping foot (a full percussive instrument), are discreetly backed by an upright bass (Jasper Mortier) and additional percussion (Arthur Bont, particularly excellent on the opening track where he puts out an Indian tabla or African talking drum-like sound). MacLeod's voice forged by years of performing around the world sounds very much like that of an authentic black bluesman from the Mississippi Delta or the East Coast Piedmont region.
A real jewel of an album, trust me. 
Oh… yes, I was about to forget this ! The man gives each of his guitars a name : "Spook", "Buckwheat", "Mule" and "Dubb" (his Resonator guitars), "Little Bit" (his Gibson), "Biscuit" (a Taylor 712), "Moon", "Scrapper"... ! ■

Doug MacLeod's site : https://doug-macleod.com

About Resonator guitars
"Spook"
● "Resonate: A Guitar Story", a 90-mn documentary feat. Doug MacLeod, Mike Dowling, Catfish Keith and Bob Brozman : https://youtu.be/k7Nw8dQWL4c

Interviews
● At the L.A. Guitar Festival, 2012 : https://youtu.be/4agIdfU_n0M
● On Texas radio KPFT 90.1 FM, 2013 : https://youtu.be/VzfnHC9wzRA
● On the Dutch De Blues Radio, 2018 : https://youtu.be/BN-03iyMuTg
● In Maastricht (Holland), 2019 : https://youtu.be/LG3_qKYGnZU
● With John Guregian for "Blues Deluxe" on WUML, 2022 : https://youtu.be/hRc4HpILxvo

Songs from the album, different live versions
→ "That Ain't Right" : https://youtu.be/1hYCxd_zCOk
→ "Coming Your Brand New Day" : https://youtu.be/RX_8VNo0ttQ
→ "Long Time Road" : https://youtu.be/qLH7ojrN9aQ
→ 'I Respectfully Decline" : https://youtu.be/cwVrx3ad4xM

Live concerts videos
(where one discovers MacLeod's talent for story telling)
Center, with Pee Wee Crayton
● The good ol' times, with Pee Wee Crayton, Big Mama Thornton, Charles Brown, Eddie 'Cleanhead' Vinson, Pasadena City College (California), 1982 :
● 30-minute show for The Folk Alliance, 2021 : https://youtu.be/mMIUVlF3QLE
● From John Nemeth's Porch, Memphis, 2020 : https://youtu.be/WoJtjHkayo8
● Mixed show and interview, Köln (Germany), 2018 : https://youtu.be/AbYNFoysL2U
● In Geldermalsen (Holland), 2017 :
● In Breda (Holland), 2017 : https://youtu.be/K59aHb80L1g
● At Carl Butlers Gospel Lounge, 2017 : https://youtu.be/VVkYpeiywW4
● With Terry Evans & Hans Theessink at the Danube Blues & Rock Festival (Romania), 2016 : https://youtu.be/6Dqv4jnjs38
● Benefit concert for the Sarasota Community radio :
● In Thornton, 2016 : https://youtu.be/QnDB6we63I4
● Several versions of the famous song "The New Panama Limited"
→ In Leiden (Holland), 2018 : https://youtu.be/asCIKlojTCk
→ In Eaton (Ohio), 2016 : https://youtu.be/sINwYw65bhQ
→ In Holland, 2014 : https://youtu.be/6ZXgTjVXL80
→ In Eindhoven (Holland), 2014 : https://youtu.be/WG8T-vGyMQA
→ At McCabe's, 2012 : https://youtu.be/h2R8OTXJsxw
● At Blues Spring, Vienna (Austria), 2014 : https://youtu.be/4hpUSGmMWck
● In Maastricht (Holland), 2012 : https://youtu.be/M0TxsuXLcDo
● On the Raven and Blues, 2012 : https://youtu.be/SxoRPZGhC4Y
● In Ingelmunster (Belgium), 2004 : https://youtu.be/nfVCeEGwGOQ
● At Cafe Boogaloo, Hermosa Beach (California), 2002 :
→ Set 1 (bad sound quality) : https://youtu.be/lNrhsEBq-IM
● On the "Horses sing none of it" TV program, 2007 : https://youtu.be/wgY_oYocWYk
● At Spagettini's, Seal Beach (California), 2000 :
● At Cafe Voltaire, Ventura (California), 1997 : https://youtu.be/LkKg-Iy9pYo
● At Sacred Grounds, San Pedro (California), 1992 : https://youtu.be/q4O_K8J09K0


The Dunvegan Castle on the Isle of Skye,
on the western coast of northern Scotland,
where MacLeod's ancestors hail from
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May 15, 2022

Angela Strehli Band - Live From Rancho Nicasio (2001)

► The album

Queen of Texas Blues
She was sexy even past 60, blonde (but not naturally), sung with legends like Muddy Waters, Stevie Ray Vaughan or W.C. Clark, with her one time accomplices Marcia Ball & Lou Ann Barton, with The Blues Broads (herself, Dorothy Morrison, Tracy Nelson & Annie Sampson), recorded a few solo albums, helped to manage and build the reputation of Austin renowned club and record label Antone's, and later of the Rancho Nicasio, an old mid-19th century stagecoach roadhouse set in the peaceful north of San Francisco Marin County, that her husband-manager Bob Brown bought and renovated in 1998. That's where this album was recorded.

With Muddy Waters
I'm not going to repeat here what's in the detailed biography joined to the album posted on Blue Dragon and mentioned below, except to remind that the lady was born in Lubbock, Texas, in 1945, and that her reputation as "Queen of Texas Blues" is much more considerable than her thin solo discography indicates : only one 3-track EP and four studio albums since her recording debut in 1986 (she was already 40). Let's also mention her joint ventures with Marcia Ball and Lou Ann Barton in 1990, and with the Blues Broads in 2012. The reason is that she appears on numerous "various artists" projects and compilations or as a guest singer on other artists works, and had an intense concert activity long before her first recording experience with musicians like those mentioned in the beginning of this review. Still she waited 2001 to do her first and only live album to date.

This one proposes solid Texas style rhythm'n'blues. Here and there a detail in Strehli's vocals or Schermer's guitar lines, reveals light country music echoes, nothing surprising for a Texan lady.
The twelve featured songs, technically very well recorded and mixed, see Strehli going through a kind of retrospective of her career. There's not one single under-level track on this live. The listener will take his pick of favorites according to his own taste.

Personally, if I was threatened to death to point out a few, I would mention "Just What It Takes", the groovy soul "A Stand By Your Woman Man", "Clean Up Woman" and "Stranger Blues" both illuminated by Schermer's top guitar work, the equally rocking "Tell Me Why", "Slipped, Tripped, Fell In Love" for the chorus vocal harmonies, "Howling For My Darling" ("whooo… hooo…"). But what about "Big Town Playboy", "It Hurts Me Too" or "You Don't Love Me" ? Wouldn't be fair not to mention these either !

The truth is that her excellent band is seriously rocking, Texas way, starting with Mike Schermer on guitar who certainly deserves his being dubbed "Mighty" and is undoubtedly the other attraction of this live. But the most impressive instrument of the lot is the lady's incredibly attractive husky vocal texture. Though she was then around 56, her voice is as powerful and full of energy as it was at her debut. Maybe more... In all cases, more sensual than ever. A perfect voice for singing the blues. ■

More infos
● Angela Strehli's bio : https://musicianguide.com/biographies/1608004819/Angela-Strehli.html
● A 2010 interview with Angela Strehli : https://www.sacramentopress.com/2010/09/25/blues-on-the-green-2-interview-with-angela-strehli/
● The Rancho Nicasio : https://ranchonicasio.com/
● Aerial discovery of the peaceful Nicasio village : https://youtu.be/Eqipl1zMkLQ

Live performances videos
● At the Austin Blues Heritage Festival (with Major Burkes Blues Band, Mark Pollack, "Little" Charlie Sexton, W.C. Clark Blues Revue, Tex Thomas & the Wranglers,  Angela Strehli Band (from 29 :00 to 38 :45), and the Cobras, 1982 : https://youtu.be/Eaj_k_uSdKM
● "Take Me To The River" with W.C. Clark & All Stars Texas Blues : https://youtu.be/sQWbcrLblAY
● "Fool In Love" with Marcia Ball : https://youtu.be/q6s4jKusTXQ
● "Stand By Your Woman", at the Frederikshavn Blues Festival, Denmark, 2007 : https://youtu.be/9A4c9pLYEYE
● With The King Snakes, Denmark, 2007 : https://youtu.be/SZ4tubvfuaA or https://youtu.be/HaUmvU3TqAk
● "Boogie Like You Wanna" with the Cobras, Austin, 2010 : https://youtu.be/RHh9dUq75Io
● With Marcia Ball and Lou Ann Barton, at Antone's, 2017 : ►
https://youtu.be/_HCs2KScQrs
● With Tommy Castro & the Painkillers and Deanna Bogart at Rancho Nicasio, 2021 : https://youtu.be/xmlmGddoliU
● Birthday perf., 2021 : https://youtu.be/-7cUYzn2uis

► With Stevie Ray Vaughan
● With SRV, Jimmie Vaughan, Jeff Beck and Kim Wilson, Hawaii, 1984 :
→ "You Were Wrong" : https://youtu.be/HfZDaJfUMXE
→ "Don't Fall For Me Baby " : https://youtu.be/zlDlfIzVVY0 or https://youtu.be/4p1VDHzoFiE or https://youtu.be/B8QlL2iY7Xo
 

► The Blues Broads : Angela Strehli, Dorothy Morrison, Tracy Nelson & Annie Sampson
● "Oh Happy Day", 2012 : https://youtu.be/agN_BnlIacw
● At the Festival de Blues, Lucerne (Switzerland), 2013 : 8-part playlist
● From the 2014 DVD) : 10-track playlist
● "Take My Love With You", at Rancho Nicasio, 2017 : https://youtu.be/EvhntGWjuN4
● "Oh Happy Day", at Rancho Nicasio, 2021 : https://youtu.be/MTv7SOQsuC0

► With "Mighty" Mike Schermer
● Denmark, 2007 :
→ "Boogie Like You Wanna" : https://youtu.be/PU6PjqW8kdw
→ "Kiddio" : https://youtu.be/EcUuBNrkMJk or https://youtu.be/LxxGxVIW9Ks
→ "C.O.D."  : https://youtu.be/LMl2fb13VcQ or https://youtu.be/7bVlRA8DrgY
→ "?" : https://youtu.be/mcKmzvFgGMY
→ "Big Town Playboy" : https://youtu.be/z85Ephqgzes

► Mighty Mike Schermer and Friends - Live At Greaseland ! Vol. 2, 2021 : https://youtu.be/AvoKuy20JO8
- Mike Schermer : guitar/vocals
- Steve Ehrmann : bass
- Paul Revelli : drums
- Tony Stead : keyboards
+ Nic Clark : harmonica
- L'il Baby : vocals
- Kid Andersen : guitar, vocals, percussion and synthesizer.
















Nicasio, a small peaceful Marin County village

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May 13, 2022

Jimmy Smith - Back At The Chicken Shack (1960)

The B-3 master
There are two ways to appreciate an album such as this one. The first is to invite a pretty woman for a late drink by your place, install the CD or vinyl, turn your hi-fi to a low volume and let Jimmy Smith weave a cool relaxing ambiance in the background helping your romantic attempt to seduce the lady. The music is secondary. This is what I call the passive way. The second way is to put your earphones on, put up the volume to a reasonable high, tune the equalizer to the appropriate settings, close your eyes and immerse yourself in the musicians work, trying to isolate and follow each instrument's part and see how they mingle together into the global result. (Note : this way doesn't forbid your feet to gently stomp the swinging beat.) This is the active way and it's rather my way.

The Incredible Jimmy Smith, as he was called, took the B-3 out of its traditional churchy gospel environment to the open as a full jazz instrument. Born in 1925 in Pennsylvania, he was already a skilled pianist since his early teens, playing in his father's entertainment show, when one day of 1955 he decided to buy a B-3 model. For a whole year, he studied the complex secrets of the instrument, practiced intensively and created his own style, before starting to perform in Philadelphia clubs in 1955 and in New York from 1956, where he was quickly remarked by famous Blue Note label bosses Alfred Lion and Francis Wolff who immediately put a contract on the table.

Considered to be the creator of a new genre, the "funk or "soul jazz", in the late 1950s-early 1960s, Smith did some forty recording sessions (!) for Blue Note between 1956 and 1963. "Back At The Chicken Shack" is from one of the 1960 sessions, actually the same one during which his album "Midnight Special" was taped.

Cool is THE word about this elegant album halfway between funky blues and jazz . Smith bubbling B-3 Hammond organ is cool, Stanley Turrentine's flamboyant tenor sax is cool, Kenny Burrell's laid-back jazz guitar is cool, and Donald "Duck" Bailey's background but essential drumming is cool.

This being clearly stated, let's add that the B-3 is a very intricate instrument, difficult to master. The whole apparatus weighs close to 200 kg ! Equipped with two manual keyboards, a pedal board, two sets of manual draw bars and one of pedal ones, numerous preset keys, built-in vibrato and chorus effects,  a unique harmonic percussion system, and a tone cabinet, it has to be coupled to an external Leslie speaker which produces the typical inimitable B-3 sound. Not surprising that it took an entire year to Smith to control such complexity.

The result, as it appears on this album, is as groovy as it is original. The five tracks on this record leave enough space for each of Smith accomplices to express himself through solo moments, starting by Turrentine.

Stanley Turrentine
The bluesy swampy swing of "Back At The Chicken Shack", though mostly dominated by Smith, sees Burrell going through a short but mellow solo. Turrentine affirms the presence of his warm hoarse sounding tenor sax on "When I Grow Too Old To Dream" and "Minor Chant", his own composition, where Bailey surges suddenly with his drums rolls. On the long Smith original "Messy Bessie", Burrell comes in front with a solo full of virtuosity. The final number, "On The Sunny Side Of The Street", a Jimmy McHugh-Dorothy Fields tune, sees Smith, Turrentine and Burrell alternate solo parts.

As for the discreet Bailey, the importance of his presence can be measured by imagining how the album would sound without him : it would undoubtedly lack something essential. ■


Infos & docs
● History of the Hammond B-3 Organ : http://theatreorgans.com/grounds/docs/history.html
● Excellent article on Smith on the "JazzProfiles" blog : https://jazzprofiles.blogspot.com/2020/02/jimmy-smith-breaking-new-ground.html
● A German documentary film on Jimmy Smith : https://youtu.be/u6s5rnLhcUQ or https://youtu.be/eUHXfPkWIbs

Live concerts videos
Donald Bailey
● On Jazz Scene USA, 1961 or 1962 : https://youtu.be/m7ZuoB_4_8E or https://youtu.be/VmUIOPyjEic
● At the Antibes Jazz Festival, Juan-les-Pins (France) with Roy Montrell on guitar & Donald Bailey on drums, 1962 : https://youtu.be/ZXsieoGSrC4
● On the Jazz 625 TV program, with Quentin Warren on guitar & Billy Hart on drums, 1965 : https://youtu.be/AB6Lvo-lsIY or https://youtu.be/gobKu4UlxSA
● On the BBC, 1965 : https://youtu.be/gobKu4UlxSA
● In Denmark (with guitarist Nathan Page & drummer Charles Crosby), 1968 : https://youtu.be/5CA-5MqVD3g
● At Salle Pleyel, Paris, with Charles Crosby on drums and Eddie McFadden on guitar, 1969 : https://youtu.be/U1mQzxx3zMI
Kenny Burrell
● In Rotterdam (Holland), 1971 (list of musicians below the video) : https://youtu.be/kmW_pWeBbBc
● Jam Session "Newport In New York", with Kenny Burrell, Roy Haynes, Clark Terry, Art Farmer, Illinois Jacquet & James Moody, 1972 : https://youtu.be/eB0_L5NKgVE
● The Jimmy Smith Quartet in Germany : https://youtu.be/t-Ztek1A7wo
● With Herman Riley(sax, flute), Carl Rocket (guitar) & James Levi (drums) : https://youtu.be/VGCyoUpPIJc
● Hammond Jazz live : https://youtu.be/VmUIOPyjEic
● At the Vitoria Jazz Festival (Spain), 1983 : https://youtu.be/pXR_INxQvw0
● In Pescara (Italy), 1983 : https://youtu.be/zNFp8WPyYPc
● At the Blue Note Club, Tokyo, with Carl Locket (guitar), Herman Riley (sax) & James Levy (drums), 1992 : https://youtu.be/5ZAUuJyn8Jc
● In Sori (Italy) with Kenny Burrell (guitar), Herman Riley (sax) and Grady Tate (drums), 1993 : https://youtu.be/qPxWpMMt2hI

The last concerts
● In Leverkusen (Germany) with Mark Whitfield on guitar, Jimmy Woode on bass & Dowell Davis on drums, 2004 : https://youtu.be/HFabbicg1d8
● In Bratislava (Slovakia), 2004 (same band as on preceding video) :











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