Malcolm Holcombe and Jared Tyler. The Hug & Pint. Glasgow. 18/5/16

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Malcolm Holcombe, on a return visit to Glasgow,  showed once again why he is considered by many to be a living connection to the age old Appalachian tradition, the front porch musician picking away  and plucking inspiration from the land, the folk around him, the music wiping away, if only for a moment, the cares and worries of the day. Holcombe, from North Carolina, is a primitive of sorts, his music unpolished, his voice rough and ready, his presence, enveloped in oversized jacket and jeans, with sunken cheeks and lank hair, the antithesis of show biz. Yet this is a man who has Steve Earle and Emmylou Harris turning up on his records, records which portray him as a master purveyor of powerful blues country and folk songs while live he can seem like the last in a line that includes Son House, Mississippi John Hurt, Dock Boggs and Doc Watson, his visceral performance riveting. There’s a quote from Ray Wylie Hubbard saying, “He scares the living bejesus out of me, as he writes from a place only a true poet knows, and channels ancient mountain tones from dark overgrown hollows where ghosts and spirits moan and plead their cases to the devil.” Well, tonight he did just that.

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Curled up on his chair, rocking back and forward at times, his guitar cradled in his lap, Holcombe was a force of nature. He seemed to attack his guitar at times, flailing against the strings, wringing out dramatic chords and flashes of picking, his manic rhythms counterpointed by the excellent Dobro playing of his long standing comrade, Jared Tyler. There were gutbucket rushes and creepy excursions into deep dark territories, songs for the working man such as Papermill Man and backwoods poetry as on Savannah Blues. There was a bruised tenderness on For The Mission Baby and a burning anger on Another Black Hole. In between several of the songs Holcombe proved to be a wellspring of somewhat gnomic advice as he recounted events from his past including  a paranoid encounter with a neon bikini clad woman on Malibu beach culminating in the sublime, “If your dog tells you what to do and his lips aren’t moving, don’t do it”.  More seriously, he left the audience in no doubt where his political alliances lay, gouging into the Bushes and offering support for immigrants most pointedly on his encore of A Far Cry From Home. On this song, Holcombe pointed out the connections between North Carolina and the Celtic homelands (mentioning Maura O’Connell who recorded the song with him) before reminding the audience that his family were immigrants back in the days and that he would welcome those who flee from the horrors of Baghdad.

He might look like a hobo but there’s a heart of gold here and an acute sense of justice. Holcombe is a treasure.

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Jared Tyler, Holcombe’s producer and sidekick offered a fine set of songs before the main man came on stage. A fine picker he has a soulful feel to his songs that at times recalled Curtis Mayfield and Ritchie Havens. He offered up a fine take on a Holcombe song, The Door (from Down The River) while a song dedicated to an old Tulsa friend was quite affecting.  Local musician John Alexander opened the evening but unfortunately Blabber’n’Smoke arrived too late to catch him and we apologise for that. Word was he was well worth catching.

 

 

Daniel Meade and The Flying Mules. Let Me Off At The Bottom. At The Helm Records

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Time then for Daniel Meade, Glasgow’s own hillbilly hell raiser, to raise the bar with his third official release and the first album to feature his wingmen, The Flying Mules. The Mules (Meade – guitar and piano, Lloyd Reid – guitar, Mark Ferrie – double bass, Thomas Sutherland – drums) are well kent faces locally with several regular slots in city bars and are veterans of tours with Pokey LaFarge and Sturgill Simpson. Indeed, they appeared as Simpson’s band on his latest Glasgow date, the US chart topper unsure about appearing before a Glasgow audience on his lonesome at the cavernous O2ABC. Meade himself has recently toured supporting and then playing alongside Diana Jones with several of the songs here making their first appearance. Now, hot on the heels of five packed shows in four days at the Kilkenny Roots Festival in Ireland last weekend, The Mules are set to unleash Let Me Off At The Bottom on the world.

Equally at home with Jerry Lee Lewis styled rockers and George Jones like laments Meade has the ability to take country music clichés and turn them into rockabilly poetry, the honky tonk hell raisers and beer stained weepers delivered with a Glaswegian gallusness. There are some fine examples in the rollicking There’s a Headstone Where Her heart Used To Be with Meade explaining, “Well I met lots of women on this rocky road, I love them whether long short or tall. Some for a weekend some twice as long but I still love them all.”  Of course he’s derailed by a femme fatale, a merry widow whose lips taste of candy, laughing with his friends as he looks on from beyond. It’s delivered with a vengeance, Meade’s honky tonk piano driving the song with an excellent guitar solo from Reid that’s half Les Paul, half Chet Atkins.

There are several hi-octane belters here, The Mules firing on all cylinders, the rhythm section tight as the proverbial duck, bass supple and slapping while the traps are expertly deployed. Back To Hell opens the album with a locomotive energy, Meade introducing one of the album’s themes, the demon drink, from the beginning. It’s a breathless dash from start to finish, again Reid throws in one of his seemingly  effortless solos, the notes curling from his guitar sweet as honey. Ghosts and Crocodiles has a jug band like infectiousness to it while Please Louise is a guaranteed crowd pleaser as Meade tries to back pedal from a shotgun marriage, his lyrics delivered expertly over the barrelhouse keyboards and fretboard wizardry, a Jordonaires type chorus the icing on the cake. He hasn’t learned his lesson on the avaricious rocker Lock Up You Daughter and it’s back to the drink for the closing The Bottle Called For Me, a saloon bar knockabout that ends with a good old rabble rousing chorus.

As infectious as these songs are (and a good indication of how superb the band are live) The Mules have other strings to their bow. As evidenced on his last album Meade can turn his hand to old time country songs and waltzes (as on his duet with Diana Jones on Help Me Tonight) and there’s a brace of these sadder tear stained moments on the album. Meade has an acute grasp on the topics that engaged George Jones and Hank Williams (heartbreak mostly), while his voice can convey the hurt just as well as the good times. He Should Have Been Mine laments with a fine plaintive piano and Poison Dart lopes along with some sweet guitar curls and a lonesome prairie feel. Best of all is the powerful confessional of Leave Me To Bleed, Meade, superbly accompanied by Siobhan Wilson on harmonies, reaching into the darker recesses of country music, his bride dead before the wedding, guilt and faith confused, the music a back porch funereal.

Midway twixt the light and dark there’s an excellent country ramble on Count The Roses which delves into George Jones territory with some style while the title song recalls the Everly Brothers with its harmonies. Like Pokey Lafarge, Meade has the ability to write songs that seem to have been around forever and here he’s forged a set of songs that cover a panoply of half a century of rockabilly and country music. The album’s a whirligig of rabble rousing honky tonk and forlorn laments all delivered with some panache.

Let Me Off At The Bottom is released on May 27th on At The Helm Records. There’s an album launch in Glasgow at The Rum Shack on the Southside on the 28th May.

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At The Helm Records

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fernando. Leave The Radio On. Fluff and Gravy/Decor Records

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Fear not, this review is ABBA free. This Fernando is Fernando Viciconte, born in Argentina but commencing his musical journey in LA with Monkey Paw, a hard rock band, before moving to Portland, Oregon in 1994. Since then he’s released several solo albums which have variously visited his Latin roots, alt-country and “gauzy, narcotic songs with Latin and country-folk accents”.  A health scare a few years back threatened his voice but he has thankfully recovered and recorded Leave The Radio On, the first of his albums (I think) to get a full UK release.

It’s getting so that Portland is the happening place to be in the States (actually, it may have been for some time and we’re just behind the curve here). Anyway, while fans of The Holy Modal Rounders will know of goings on eons ago, for the past decade or so it’s been a magnet for musicians, Peter Buck of REM the latest drawn to live there. We mention this as Fernando has a dream list of Portland musicians on the album. no surprise really when you consider that Willie Vlautin of Richmond Fontaine is on record as saying that Viciconte is “one of my all time favourite singer-songwriters”. Vlautin doesn’t appear here  but Daniel Eccles and Freddie Trujillo from RF are both onboard along with Paul Brainard, Scott McCaughey and Mr. Buck himself who variously plays guitar, sitar and mandolin on eight of the 11 songs. In addition there’s another “unsung” Portland musician here in the shape of Lewi Longmire on guitars and keyboards. A long time associate of Fernando, Longmire also has a history with various Rounders and the esteemed Michael Hurley, so, nice to see him in here.

The album itself is a polished affair. Viciconte’s voice is high in the mix, his tremulous vocals recalling at times Bowie and Lennon.  There’s little of his dusty Americana background although there’s a fine laid back vibe to the wonderful pedal steel and mandolin whorled Kingdom Come while the spectral White Trees oozes with a mysticism heightened by the simple ritualistic percussion, shadows gathering in the gloomy bass and subdued organ. Instead, we get the dark psychedelic soundscape of The Dogs, surely indebted to The Pretty Things in their lysergic days and the kaleidoscopic guitar tumblings of The Freak, a song that roots into Bowie’s 70’s paranoia (turn this one up loud). Buck’s presence isn’t flag posted throughout the album but it’s tempting to think that the churning guitar charge of Burned Out Love, a fantastic slice of power pop is a nod to him and Minus Five chap McCaughey. Turns out that the guitar here is handled by Fernando’s co-producer Luther Russell but it certainly hits the heights, a glorious addition to the canon of sun kissed guitar pop. Fernando certainly knows his way around a hook, the opening and closing songs here both memorable slices of dark melodic rock with shades of The Dream Syndicate and The Church lurking in there. Finally, there’s the odd seeming combination of Fernando sounding like Bowie on El Interior. Here, glistening guitars lead one into a twilight zone, an infra red desert, the singer stranded, his thoughts clouded by the intrusive Mariachi band. Whether Fernando intended this or not the song is a fine summation of the gin sozzled Thomas Jerome Newton damned in New Mexico. A wonderful song.

Good news is that Fernando is appearing near you soon as he is supporting Richmond Fontaine on their farewell tour.  Dates are here.

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Doghouse Roses/Joseph Parsons. The Hug & Pint. Glasgow. Friday 8th April 2016

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A welcome return to Glasgow for one of our favourite duos, Doghouse Roses. An extremely packed venue saw singer (and guitarist) Iona MacDonald and guitarist Paul Tasker unveil some songs from their forthcoming album (with some early teasers available via a tour only EP). In addition, Tasker has just released his first solo album, Cold Weather Music, but he was modest enough to only mention it once and only play one tune from his instrumental disc.

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First up was Joseph Parsons, an American living in Germany whom the Roses had befriended on their continental jaunts. Parsons, accompanied by the very nimble fingered Freddi Lubitz delivered a fine set of songs that saw him savage George Bush Jnr. and pay tribute to friends who were victims of the AIDS epidemic on the touching Roman & Michael. He opened the set with the excellent regretful love song, Guess I’m A Fool Again and offered some noirish LA sheen on Dume Room. With Lubitz on second guitar, playing his solos with a refined touch on the effects pedal, Parsons conjured up some fine sounds. Broken Vows, based on an Irish Gaelic poem was a particularly powerful performance.

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The Roses’ duo gave a fine, relaxed and freewheeling performance, obviously pleased that the fans came out. With a mixture of old and new songs Iona MacDonald showed why she is one of the best singers around while Tasker continues to shine on guitar. He’s probably fed up with the Bert Jansch comparisons but from the off the opening bars of the opening song, Thunder Of The Dawn begged for it, the song as a whole an impressive opener. A couple of new songs were next unveiled, Pour, a fine lament on alcohol abuse and Feed the Monster a political message, both promising for the new album but they really hit their stride on the magnificent Woodstock (a different song) which showed why the pair might be considered a weird amalgamation of early Jefferson Airplane and The Pentangle.

There was a fine air of jollity around, a running joke regarding Iona’s guitar playing, Paul, the tutor, explaining the chords for some songs but there was no doubting the gravitas of a song like Fairground, the story of a prostitute. They ended the set with a tremendous rendition of Gone There, Tasker’s guitar rippling away as MacDonald’s voice soared, a fine example of all that is best about the pair.

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The night ended with a good old-fashioned encore. Not the type where the band run off and then back on again but a genuine addition to the night’s pleasure. All four musicians came on stage and after a wee bit of fiddling about launched into a trio of covers which the crowd lapped up, an opportunity for a singsong.  The Dead’s Friend Of The Devil and the traditional  I Know You Rider  were great fun but it was the closing cover of Lowell George’s Willin’ which really hit home. The band and audience as one as we all sang along. A cracking end to a cracking night.

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Joseph Parsons

 

 

Talking about imaginary westerns and Doghouse Roses with Paul Tasker

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It’s been a while since we’ve heard from Doghouse Roses, the duo of Iona MacDonald and Paul Tasker whose two albums and several EPs showcased Tasker’s mastery of the acoustic guitar and MacDonald’s sublime singing voice. Collaborations with The Willard Grant Conspiracy and shows with acts as disparate as Raul Malo and Pokey LaFarge culminated in the excellent 2010 album This Broken Key, described by one reviewer as, “Perfection, or as near to perfection as we might reasonably expect.”  Since then however the band have kept a low profile, only surfacing for the occasional gig until, galvanised by a support slot for US cult rockers, Television, they went back into the studio in 2015 and also embarked on a tour of Germany. A tour only EP was released but now they have a new album (Lost Is Not Losing) in the can and will be playing a set of dates in April. In addition, Tasker is releasing a solo album, an all instrumental record called Cold Weather Music, at the end of this month. In anticipation of this flurry of activity Blabber’n’Smoke managed to meet up with Paul Tasker to speak with him about his album but we kicked things off by asking for an update on the Doghouse Roses album.

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It’s been nearly six years since Broken Key. What have the band been up to in that time?

We worked really hard from 2007 through until about 2011 and we really just burned out, we weren’t really enjoying it anymore. We didn’t stop as such, we still did small gigs here and there. There was never a plan to start it up again but then some serious gigs were offered to us including a BBC television slot and we enjoyed rehearsing and playing again and some new songs came out of that so we decided to give it another go. As I said, we never stopped but we didn’t have the heart back then to go through the stuff to make another record because if you’re going to do that you really need to want to do it. It’s a lot of work and there’s a lot of obstacles. So we eventually decided to go into La Chunky studios in Glasgow’s Hidden Lane and we worked with Johnny Smillie for four days, we had a German tour booked at the start of 2015 so we did a tour only EP for that. After that we recorded the album with some guests on it, Laura Beth Salter on mandolin and Dejan Lapanja from Slovenia on guitar. We have bass and drums from Steff and Craig from the New International and Jo Shaw and John Alexander are also on the album. Playing as a duo live is one thing but on a record, well, the pinnacle is Gillian Welsh and Dave Rawlings but look how much they’ve played live together and yet they only do an album every six or seven years. I think it’s difficult to hold interest throughout a duo type album.

Is there a release date for Lost Is Not Losing?

It’s finished but because I’ve got my album coming out we don’t want to release this one until later in the year and we want to have a properly  thought out plan leading up to that. That was one thing about Broken Key, we didn’t really have a plan. We just put it out and hoped for the best but it’s a hard world out there and things just get lost. You really need to start the ball rolling, the PR stuff from the moment you get into the studio. I really don’t check out stuff like Facebook as much as I should but you can see bands there who are constantly updating what’s going on, what they’re doing and, needless to say we didn’t do that. Now we have a news page on the website but people have to find that whereas Facebook finds you. We’re hoping for a November release but a lot depends on our touring plans as we want to be able to promote it properly.

So after six years can we expect a different sounding Doghouse Roses?

Well, when me and Iona recorded this we did it live, sitting next to each other and it worked out really well. Before, when we recorded, we were separated, we could see each other but we weren’t close together and I think that’s made a difference. The majority is acoustic guitar and voice with four songs featuring a band. It’s still us writing the songs but I think it sounds a bit different, a bit fresher. And we recorded it using all sixties gear so that adds something to the sound.

I thought the song you’ve previewed from the album, Diesel Engine, had a “retro” feel to it, a nice early sixties, even fifties snap.

I bought a 1958 Harmony Rocket and I used it on Diesel Engine and it has that sort of sound. It was a really strummy number when we did it live but when we were recording it we slowed it down so it had a kind of groove rather than a drive and I put probably far too many guitar layers on it.  But there’s some nice harmonies in there. I’m working with another band, Colour Of Whisky which is like a vocal band so we got all them in to do harmonies. It turned out quite nice.

While we’re waiting for the April shows from the band and the release of Lost Is Not Losing there’s your solo album, Cold Weather Music, to look forward to. Can you tell us about that?

It’s been a couple of years in the making. I’ve basically made the album three times now. The first time was in 2010 but it I really didn’t get down what I was hoping for although it was a good learning curve of sorts. So I tried again in 2012 with Luigi Pisquini, a recording engineer, and we hired this place called the Recording Cottage in Inveraray. This time it was closer but still not quite there although a couple of the tracks from this session are on the album. Eventually I ended up at Green Door studios, an old analogue recording place and it was just the right space so essentially I’ve made the album three times before being happy with it. It’s all instrumental, two of the tunes, Husker’s Theme and Tundra Plane feature banjo, Sky Train and Ne’er Day are duets with flute and guitar, Blooms in the Autumn and InE are guitar duets, that’s me and Dejan, and the others are just me on guitar.

I believe that you’ve said that it’s like a soundtrack for a movie that hasn’t been filmed.

Well when I was working on some of the pieces, James Morrison at Whisky and Milk was writing a screenplay for a Western and he asked me if I had some music that sounded American as well as Scottish so I tried a few things on the banjo and one of them turned into Husker’s Theme. I worked from some pictures James had taken and I tried to evoke the scenes and we took a little road trip up to the Highlands and that’s where most of the artwork in the album comes from. So yes, it’s a bit like a soundtrack for a film that, as you say, hasn’t been made yet.

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Why’s it called Cold Weather Music.

When we were away in 2009, I think it was in Denmark, someone came up and said, “You guys play cold weather music, no one would ever think you come from a place like Spain” and I quite liked that. A lot of the music I like, people like Ólafur Arnalds, you can tell it’s from a cold country. Although I like Samba and Tango and such I can’t really relate to it.

Aside from the album being available as a CD and digital download you’re also releasing it on vinyl. I take it that you’re a fan of the format.

I actually got into records just when it was changing over to CDs. There was a place called Borderline in Galashiels and one day I went in and instead of just having the odd piece of vinyl they had boxes and boxes of it. Someone had traded in their collection and there were some classic records there.  I remember there used to be a ton of records shops on Byres Road, you could do a record shop crawl. Those days are gone although they do seem to be coming back in a small way.

The album’s a wonderful evocation of the landscapes featured in the photographs, the banjo and pedal steel adding, as you said, an American touch to the Highland mists. It will probably surprise folk who always compare your playing to the likes of Bert Jansch.

Well Jansch was my first touchstone. That’s who I wanted to sound like when I first started playing but these days I’ll find myself playing something and I’ll think, “Oh, that’s just like third rate Jansch,” so I’ll cut that bit out. When I started to play it was the height of Brit Pop and I thought that was god-awful and then I saw Jansch at The Press Club on West Nile St. and I thought he was brilliant. Before that I had no real direction to follow on the guitar but after that show I tried to find his albums. Back then Bert and a lot of others like him were having a real dip in popularity, I mean there were only about 30 people at the gig and his records were hard to find.  But I got as many as I could find and to me it was a whole new mysterious world of playing the guitar, trying to figure out how he did that and then trying yourself to do it. And so when I started writing songs I wasn’t actually lifting his stuff but I was “borrowing” things so that the first Doghouse Roses songs did have that Jansch type sound to them.

What guitarists do you listen to these days?

Well these days I think I listen to more piano players than guitarists. I really like Nils Frahm and Oscar Peterson. When I play guitar these days I try to think of it more as a piano than a guitar

So 2016 is looking to be a busy year for you.

Well first off, we’ve got Joseph Parsons coming over from the US and we’re doing four shows with him in April.  It will be nice to get out and get back to playing; Iona’s really looking forward to the shows.  I’m so glad to have the solo album done, it had become a bit of a millstone, but I’ll be playing some of the tunes from the album at these shows. I’m also doing a solo show on the 15th at Woodend and then hopefully later in the year I’ll be able to gather all the players for a show to play the album in full. After that we can concentrate on the run up to the release of Lost Is Not Losing.

Dates for Doghouse Roses April shows are here. Blabber’n’Smoke’s review of Paul Tasker’s Cold Weather Music will be here soon, in the meantime he’s playing at Woodend  Bowling Club for Sounds In The Suburbs tomorrow, 15th March supporting Locust Honey. You can buy his album here

Doghouse Roses website

 

 

The Strange Blue Dreams EP. Holy Smokes Records

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Glasgow audiences have always had a soft spot for some retro rock so it should be no surprise that there’s a buzz about The Strange Blue Dreams, a quintet who, judging by this debut EP, have been supping at the well of Sun Records with dollops of Gene Pitney, Chris Isaak, Richard Hawley and mondo surf movie soundtracks to follow. Released at the beginning of March the lead song on the EP, Reverberating Love, has been play listed on Radio Scotland, Vic Galloway and Roddy Hart are fans and the band were invited to play at the closing event of the Glasgow Film Festival, fitting perhaps as the video for Reverberating Love is a work of art in itself. The band plugging into an elegant yesteryear, the monochrome perfectly capturing a film noir effect, all Fritz Lang and Orson Welles, shadows and light and all.

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The band are not gung ho retro rockabilly fiends. There’s an element of sophistication in the songs, a skip that Orson Welles might not recognise in his role as Hank Quinlan in Touch Of Evil but would surely have relished as the twinkle eyed Harry Lime in The Third Man, dark but tantalising with an almost vaudevillian touch. This is most evident on Up To The Stars, the third song here, merrily dancing along with a Gypsy tipsiness, an Eastern romance with a circus touch, a kaleidoscopic merry go round.

The Sun And The Moon is another song with a skip in its step, its jauntiness a Richard Hawley like song with a big smile on its face, the guitars scooping up happiness as singer Dave Addison tells a tale of cosmic rivalry twixt the two orbs amidst some great whistling. Shadows and light again.

Reverberating Moon, the lead track, is the jewel in the crown here. Reverb set to stun, attitude to cool, they strut excellently through this vibrant slice of shimmying and shivering rock’n’roll recalling elements of Barry Gray’s theme song for Fireball XL5 and the work of Joe Meek.

The band are appearing at the Glasgow edition of Country To Country and will be playing the EP and other songs at Hereford (Mar 18), London (Mar 19) and Dundee (Apr 9).

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Holy Smokes Records

Dan Stuart, Tom Heyman, Fernando Viciconte @ The Fallen Angels Club. Glasgow 25/2/16

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That sardonic grin, the black humour and occasional snarl can only mean one thing, Dan Stuart is back in town. With a new album under his belt, the invigorating slice of punk/garage rampage that is Marlowe’s Revenge, recorded with Mexico’s Twin Tones, Stuart is carousing around the country and further abroad with what he called tonight an old-fashioned variety show. No jugglers or performing animals, no comedians or showgirls but some comedy and political satire was promised. Fancy words for what was in reality Stuart and chums (in this case and for the rest of the UK dates Tom Heyman and Fernando Viciconti) but there was an element of an old fashioned package tour in there, Stuart the MC, providing the introductions (and the comedy) as he goofed about and mugged unashamedly before getting down to business. There were laughs and chortles aplenty, an impression of a besotted fan (with a Cockney accent) who remembered seeing a gig back in ’86, an ongoing argument with his amplification pedal, the occasional (and noisy) plumbing in the venue and his infamous brush with spear guns in an Edinburgh hotel just some of the pearls thrown to the crowd.

For those who want the wasted youthful Stuart from his days in Green On Red or who have honed in on his well publicised meltdown and incarceration in a mental institution prior to his flight to Mexico this larger than life and invigorated presence must have come as a bit of a surprise. For sure Stuart has a chip or two on his shoulder and there’s still an element of danger, of teetering on the edge about him but over the past few years he’s produced an amazing body of work. The sublime Deliverance Of Marlowe Billings record, an EP of home demos and the raw vitality of the new album along with his “false memoir” which is as good a rock’n’roll binge as any published since Ian Hunter’s Diary of A Rock’n’Roll Star. Tonight he appeared fit and limber, racing around the stage, energy in abundance and if there’s a devil on his tail then it’s going to have its work cut out trying to keep up with him.

With the introductions done Stuart introduced Fernando Viciconte on stage. Argentinian born, now domiciled in Portland Oregon, Viciconte has only recently returned to the recording studio after some health problems. Portland buddies, Peter Buck, Paul Brainard and Scott McCaughey are all on his new album, Leave The Radio On and tonight, armed only with his guitar he offered some insights into the album, in particular a moving Kingdom Come. He delved into his Latin roots for a sweetly affecting song sung in Spanish before a muscular reading of True Instigator from his 2011 album of the same name. However his most powerful and moving song was his closing tribute to the late Jimmy Boyers, a stalwart of the Portland music scene who recently passed away. Here Viciconte sang Hank Williams’ Angel of Death imbuing it with a Johnny Cash like gravitas.

Next up Dan Stuart introduced us to Tom Heyman, an SF musician by way of Philadelphia who has a CV to die for (Chuck Prophet, Alejandro Escovido, Go To Blazes, John Doe) and who recently released the excellent album That Cool Blue Feeling. Stuart’s introduction provided us with one of the lines of the night as he tried to describe Heyman’s music ending with the immortal words, “It’s not fucking Americana!” Perched on a stool and hunched over his acoustic guitar (with a very interesting headstock) Heyman parried Viciconte’s high and lonesome leanings with his bluesy and folky urban cool opening with Time and Money from the new album. Cool and Blue showcased his fine guitar picking on a wistful love note while Always Be Around saw him ringing notes from his instrument. A fine raconteur himself Heyman added to the merriment of the night when he spoke about his shared experience with Stuart, both having played with the mighty Chuck Prophet and both then suffering from PTCD, that is, post traumatic Chuck disorder. Black Mollies sounded like something that Bobbie Gentry might have recorded had she been on steroids and he topped his set with a great delivery of Chickenhawks and Jesus Freaks, a song that, to my mind, does touch all the Americana bases (we could argue this all night), whatever it’s a tremendous song. Heyman again closed his set with a cover, a fine and heartfelt rendition of Phil Ochs I Ain’t Marchin’ Anymore.

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Time then for the ringmaster to jump into the spotlight and with Heyman remaining on stage to add his guitar to Stuart’s the man launched into the aching Over My Shoulder from the new album. The Whores Above was the snarling Stuart beloved of old and was followed by a cover of Lou Reed’s Vicious, Stuart’s riposte to one of the reviews of his latest disc and a riff he defiantly returned to throughout the night with him deriding the reviewer prior to Name Hog. While he and Heyman were able to whip up some fine storms on their guitars there were quieter moments, his emotional scars on show on Why I Ever Married You and there was a tender reading of The Greatest, Stuart’s paean to Mohammed Ali, one of his heroes. Heyman was sterling on guitar throughout, whether punching out taut lines or adding some cutting slide and bottleneck and abiding Stuart’s rather random approach to guitar tuning. And of course, despite his disdain for the rock’n’roll ride, Stuart delivered several songs from his past, songs that once were pulverised by the garage abandon of Green On Red but now sit finely in his canon. Rock’n’Roll Disease, Baby Loves Her Gun, 16 Ways (with Heyman really on the ball here), Gravity Talks and Time Ain’t Nothin were all delivered, the latter less of a punk sneer now, more a reflection on the arrogance of youth. Scattered throughout the set, for some these songs might have been the gravy on the pie and there’s no denying the frisson of hearing Stuart revisit these but overall the new songs show that he still delivers and he does so in spades.

There was another cover to end the night, Fernando bounded back on stage for this “unholy trinity” to delight us with their rendition of The Stones’ Dead Flowers, some of the audience joining in on this song that perhaps, many years ago, set the young Dan Stuart on his wayward path. A fine end to what was a fantastic evening. Mr. Stuart is on the road for several more weeks, the dates are here, if he’s near you then do go and see a man who is rock’n’roll to his fingertips and prepare to be amused, transfixed and mesmerised.

Norrie McCulloch. These Mountain Blues. Black Dust Records

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Ayrshire man Norrie McCulloch’s 2014 album, Old Lovers Junkyard, remains possibly Blabber’n’Smoke’s favourite Scottish album of the decade. McCulloch, seemingly from nowhere, wove a magnificent tapestry of country and folk influenced sounds on the album, its creamy pedal steel to the fore. However, as we mentioned when reviewing the album, there was more than a hint of classic UK folk rock lurking in the grooves, in particular the slightly jazz inflected keyboard work that John Martyn and Nick Drake used to adorn their songs on the cusp of the sixties and seventies. These Mountain Blues, due for release in February, reverses the mix. Yes, there are some sublime songs here which could stand tall beside the works of Townes Van Zandt or Guy Clark, the pedal steel still warms but the prominent instrument here is the piano, its cascading notes colouring the album with an autumnal melancholy and offering an understated grandeur. A perfect accompaniment for McCulloch’s excellent sense of nostalgia and regret expressed through his songs and his very fine, slightly wearied, voice.

Recorded live to analogue tape in the space of three days at The Tolbooth in Stirling (which just happened to have a baby grand piano in situ), These Mountain Blues captures McCulloch and his band (Dave McGowan, upright bass, piano and pedal steel; Marco Rea, bass and piano and Stuart Kidd, drums) in fine fettle. There’s an intimate organic feel to the disc as if they were playing in your room conjuring the images from the songs in front of you. McCulloch’s writing is evocative as he sings of his landscapes, his forebears and his descriptions of outsiders trying to fit in as on the impressive New Joke.

The album opens with Calico Days, a punchy acoustic guitar riff, not dissimilar to Bert Jansch’s work with Pentangle, grabs you before the rhythm section and piano glide in. A hymn in praise of life and the power of music McCulloch welcomes “old friends,” urging them to “bring your stories and your grace on these Calico days.” It’s a wonderful breeze of a song and the most upbeat on the album although the sweeping Pass By My Door which follows is a close contender. Here McCulloch captures some of that heady mix of folk, blues and jazz which informed Van Morrison on songs such as Young Lovers Do on astral Weeks. The freewheeling vibrancy and joyousness of the song is really that good, the piano celebrant, the lyrics approaching Morrison’s stream of consciousness way back then.

However if there’s a template for this album then it’s a fair bet that John and Beverly Martyn’s Stormbringer would fit the bill. Recorded in Woodstock in 1970 with Levon Helm on drums that album was produced by Joe Boyd with arrangement by Paul Harris who also played the very elegant piano parts. The sound they created informs much of These Mountain Blues with the title song a fine example. It’s a poignant recollection of McCulloch’s visit to the grave of Townes Van Zandt and as it soars and weeps the piano chords are resonant amid the guitar balladry at the heart of the song. Hard To Be The Man You Are Not and New Joke follow in similar style, wearied songs almost limping along but buoyed up by the piano along with pedal steel on the latter and it’s pedal steel which predominates on the tremendous When She Is Crying Too, a song which fulfils the promise shown on Old Lovers Junkyard. It’s a beautiful song, expertly played; steel guitar gliding over the slow rhythm and rich piano playing as McCulloch turns in a great vocal and lyrics,

” when that thief nightime comes around and steals the stars before they’re even out / that’s not the only crime even when you’re not here/ all it takes is a song for the pieces of my heart to start to disappear.”

Wreathed in a forlorn LA country vibe, When She Is Crying Too has some of the emotional heft and melancholic beauty of Gene Clark in its veins and is the stand out song here. That’s not to dismiss the remainder as McCulloch sings of his grandfather’s travails in the coal mines on Black Dust, a song that is defiantly rooted in local folk roots while The Old Room is another heady bout of nostalgia delivered with a light touch. Cloudberry Flowers is suffused with jangling acoustic guitar and woody bass and again captures some of that late sixties folk vibe and the album closes with another superb song, the ethereal Heart’s Got To Be In The Right Place. This tale of a split family, mother and father separating, is given a superb arrangement, the instruments delicately tip toeing around each other as McCulloch sounds forlorn, it’s a song that tugs at the heartstrings.

Richly textured, warm and chilling, soaked in memories and delivered with its heart on its sleeve These Mountain Blues is proof that Norrie McCulloch is mining a rich seam of songwriting. He transcends his influences creating some beautiful music which deserves to be heard by all who care about music.

Release date 26th February but you will be able to pre order the album on CD or vinyl soon via Norrie’s website

Favourite albums of 2015

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Well it’s that time of year again when we make up lists. Some get songs written about them (Santa’s naughty or nice one), some guide us around the supermarket, ensuring we don’t forget that all important stuffing. Blogs. Well, blogs do their “best of the year” lists so here’s Blabber’n’Smoke’s list of our favourite albums of the year. They’re not in any order (other than alphabetical) so there’s no number one and no losers, just some great music. 2015 was a bumper year for country music with young artists wresting the spotlight away from the ‘bros; back home there were some excellent releases that have received international recognition on websites, blogs and radio stations scattered across the globe. I’ve separated local releases simply because I think it’s important to highlight Scottish made music, had it been a straightforward top ten several of these would be in there. I’ve provided links to reviews where possible.

My thanks to all the artists, PR Agents and labels who have been kind enough to submit their efforts for Blabber’n’Smoke scrutiny, we love you. To them and to all readers have a happy festive season however you care to celebrate it.

Anna & Elizabeth. Anna & Elizabeth. Free Dirt records

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Brent Best. Your Dog, Champ. At The Helm Records/Last Chance Records

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David Corley, Available Light, Continental Song City

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Danny and The Champions Of The World, What Kind Of Love, Loose Music

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Justin Townes Earle. Single Mothers/Absent Fathers. Loose Music

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Barna Howard, Quite A Feelin’, Loose Music

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Sam Lewis Waiting On You. Brash Music

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Jeremy Pinnell OH/KY Sofaburn Records, 2015

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Michael Rank & Stag. Horsehair. Louds Hymn Music

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Daniel Romano, If I’ve Only one Time Askin’, New West Records

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Pharis and Jason Romero, A Wanderer I’ll Stay, Lula Records

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Sacri Cuori, Delone, Glitterbeat

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Cale Tyson, Introducing Cale Tyson, Clubhouse Records

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Homegrown

Stevie Agnew & Hurricane Road. Bad Blood & Whiskey. Skimmin’ Stone Records

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Dark Green Tree, Secret Lives, Haven Records

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James Edwyn & the Borrowed Band – The Tower

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Daniel Meade Keep Right Away. From The Top Records

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Iain Morrison. Eas. Peatfiredog Records.

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Findlay Napier. VIP Very Important Persons Cheerygroove Records.

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Dean Owens. Into The Sea. Drumfire Records

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The Wynntown Marshals, The End Of The Golden Age, Blue Rose Records

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Honourable mentions

Lewis and Leigh Hidden Truths EP.

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Blue Rose Code Grateful

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And that’s about it. Lots to look forward to in the New Year, not least albums from Norrie McCulloch and Blue Rose Code in the next few weeks and of course, Celtic Connections. See ya.

Jim Dead & The Doubters. Pray For Rain

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Been a while since we heard from Jim Dead, Glasgow’s premier purveyor of dry gulch rock. His last missive from the missions was  I’m Not Lost back in 2013 where he and his compadre Craig Hughes plugged in with a crackling intensity. On Pray For Rain Dead has resurrected his occassional backing band The Doubters (on this occasion comprised of Stuart Begley on guitar; Frankie Coia on bass and Tommy Clark on drums ) and with his new posse in tow seems to have been spending some time in a bar with a jukebox populated with early ZZ Top and Creedence discs. It’s a cantankerous listen, scribbled with quarrelling guitars and a heavy bass/drum thud, Dead’s voice wailing like a biblical prophet. While his previous releases have always had a whiff of Morricone inspired dusty vistas here the gloves are off and the band are howling at the moon.

One of the highlights of Dead’s previous full length album, Ten Fires, was the loping death sentence of John Landstrom Must Die and it’s this song that is the template for Pray For Rain. Dead and Begley’s guitars spar throughout be it the on the jagged juggernaut that is the opening song, Wooden Kimono, the sludge ridden blues riff of the title song or the evil slide opening to You Coulda Said, the latter especially invigorating. There’s evidence of Dead’s allegiance to metal with Lovesick Blues sounding like an unholy marriage of Black Sabbath and Blue Cheer as Dead screams, “You don’t love me, I don’t like me too” over an almighty riff. And overall the riff is king here as Dead & The Doubters demolish the melodies on their steamroller ride with May The Road Rise an almighty example.

There are glimpses of Dead’s earlier incarnations. Crows On The Wire is a jaunty country rock romp (although it’s wired to the moon with its zinging guitar lines) and Home returns to his role as a shamanistic weatherman singing, “There’s a wind coming in from the west, woman by my side says she knows best. It’s taken all I have just to find a place where I can stop and have a rest.” It opens up with a resigned air, slowly jangled guitar over a slow beat before an excellent fuzzed guitar solo weighs in. This yin/yan dynamic persists throughout the song with Dead sounding increasingly desperate. The album closes with the slow burn of I’m Not Lost (a song that wasn’t on the EP of the same name) that harks back to the Neil Young like epics of Ten Fires. A seven minute long miasma of thrashing and squalling guitars with a Crazy Horse backbeat it pummels the listener into surrender.

Jim Dead & The Doubters will be playing at the album release show at the 13th Note in Glasgow on Friday 4th December with support from Craig Hughes’ Dog Howl Moon. If Dead can summon up the intensity he’s captured here it should be a fine night.

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