SMM #49: April 2nd, 2023
New releases for April, a well rounded blues playlist, and a couple of new features including a roundup of what I'm currently listening to and a review of some literature on The Rolling Stones.
New Releases
GA-20 - Live in Loveland… blues-rockin’ trio formed in 2017 by Matt Stubbs, the guitarist from veteran blues harpist Charlie Musselwhite’s band (check out Charlie in this issue’s Playlist)… after releasing three excellent studio albums, GA-20 have followed up with this live album recorded in Loveland, OH, that mixes covers and originals that, per Shindig! Magazine “sound uncannily like vintage cuts being revisited and thoroughly re-energized”…
DADDY LONG LEGS - Street Sermons… Brooklyn band is a throwback trio that combines 60s garage rock with vintage blues… they started out with a more punkish, gritty sound but have polished some of the edges since moving to a larger label (Yep Roc) in 2019... lead singer Brian Hurd’s wailin’ harmonica is the dominant instrument on most of the tracks but guitarist Murat Aktürk also gets in some solid licks…
WILLIAM TYLER & THE IMPOSSIBLE TRUTH - Secret Stratosphere… Tyler is a highly-regarded acoustic and electric guitarist who has recorded in a variety of styles including experimental, primitive folk, alternative/indie rock and country-driven rock… his latest is a live recording from 2021 where he teamed up with an all-star band (pedal steel, bass, drums) to revisit several selections from his back catalog in electric, jam-band style… Tyler is an inventive guitarist who keeps things interesting… reminiscent of Steve Gunn, another outstanding guitarist with a similar sound and resume...
MIKE STINSON & JOHNNY IRION - Working My Way Down… veteran country/folk-rockers team up for their first album together - one that they first started working on 25 years ago with a since deceased songwriting partner… it’s a solid listen with lots of catchy tunes… Irion is better known for his duo albums with his wife, Sarah Lee Guthrie (daughter of Arlo Guthrie, grand-daughter of Woody) while Stinson has released several well-received solo albums…
What I’m Listening To
Trying a new feature here listing some of the albums and tunes I’ve been listening to lately… I listen to a LOT of music every week and most of it doesn't fit into “New Releases” or needs to be singled out as a “spotlight” album, but maybe deserves more of a mention than a single song on a playlist… so here are some notable things I listened to the past couple weeks:
Tyron Benoit - Waitin’ on Friday… recently came across this debut album from this New Orleans artist… it deftly incorporates many musical styles but, overall, retains that “Louisiana/NOLA” sound… nicely done!
Chris Forsyth - Evolution Here We Come… I consider Forsyth to be one of the few “guitar heroes” to emerge in the 21st century… this is his most recent album, released in 2022 and was highlighted in SMM #39…
Mark “Porkchop” Holder - Death and the Blues… this guy’s catalog consists of 2 albums released in 2017 but he rocks hard & absolutely nails the RL Burnside/Johnny Winter slide guitar thing (great name too!)...
Magic Tuber Stringband - Tarantism… acoustic instrumental jam music with guitar, fiddle & cello that is somewhere in between Appalachian folk and experimental psychedelia… probably too “out there” for the average music fan but “Trumpet of the Dead” and “Orb-Weaver” should be accessible for most listeners…
Mick Clarke - Big Wheel… grizzled veteran blues-rock guitarist has a bottomless well of great riffs and he has cranked out a huge amount of material since Covid hit… this album from 2020 is a good example of what Clarke does best - laying down the boogie!
Playlist: Got the Blues, Vol. 2
Time for some blues! It’s a nice mix of many blues styles: harp masters (Charlie Musselwhite, Junior Wells, Bob Corritore, William Clarke), guitar greats (Smokey Wilson, Hubert Sumlin, Otis Rush, Guitar Shorty), Texas roadhouse blues (Long John Hunter, Omar & The Howlers), Mississippi juke joint blues from T-Model Ford and piano man Eddie Boyd backed by Peter Green-era Fleetwood Mac…
I used to be a huge blues fan in the 80s and 90s and saw some of the blues legends above in NYC in the late 80s… saw Otis Rush at the Village Gate in 1989, a club on Bleecker Street in Greenwich Village that closed back in 1994… sat at a table right in front of his microphone stand… along with his guitar skills, Otis was also a great vocalist and songwriter and his songs were covered by numerous artists… he was a particular favorite of Eric Clapton who covered several of his songs over the years (“All Your Love,” “Double Trouble,” “Groaning the Blues”)... also saw Junior Wells three times in 1988-89 when he was touring together with Buddy Guy…once at the Lone Star Cafe, a great small club that closed in 1989, then at the Beacon Theatre as part of a blues show with Johnny Winter and Dr. John and the last time on a Blues Cruise around Manhattan… that was a fun show - I remember being allowed to bring a small cooler of beer on the boat (that’s not happening anymore!) and seeing Buddy & Junior up close hanging out smoking cigarettes in the cabin…
Reader’s Corner: The Rolling Stones
This is another new feature I’m going to try… I have a VERY extensive library of books on music so thought I would periodically highlight my favorite ones if anyone is interested in expanding their knowledge of rock music history…
I have read a bunch of books on the Rolling Stones so I’m going to start with them… the most well known Stones book is probably Keith Richards 2011 autobiography, Life… great book, some of you have probably read it, but I’m going to focus on the mini-genre of books by journalists who traveled with the band on a specific tour or tours and were given broad access to the band:
The True Adventures of The Rolling Stones (2000) by Stanley Booth
This book was originally published in 1984 under the title, Dance with the Devil and a 30th anniversary edition from 2014 is also now available… it is Booth’s riveting eyewitness account of the life & times of the Stones while living with them on their 1969 U.S. tour that ended at the infamous concert at Altamount in CA… Booth is a Memphis-based writer who was part of the initial wave of rock journalists that emerged in the 60s, a group that deeply loved the music but also, at times, covered it with a pretentious arrogance you don’t really see anymore… along with his tales of the Stones exploits, the book is considered by many of his fellow writers to be a definitive work on the decade of the 1960s… definitely worth reading is the afterward where Booth tells the crazy story of how and why it took him 15 years to get this book published…
S.T.P. - A Journey Through America with the Rolling Stones (2002, 1974) by Robert Greenfield
This book was originally published in 1974 but was long out of print by the time this 2002 edition came along… the author states that at the time of its original release it was the “very first full-length book ever published about a rock ‘n’ roll tour”... this book covers the Stones 1972 U.S. tour in support of their classic album, Exile on Main Street and like Booth in 1969, Greenfield went along on the tour and had total access, reporting on all of the decadence, sex, drugs and rock & roll he witnessed… Stones tours were MAJOR events back then that attracted all sorts of celebrities, Hollywood types, models, fellow musicians, drug dealers, groupies and other hangers-on - people who were “both famous and infamous” as Greenfield put it…
The Sun & The Moon & The Rolling Stones (2016) by Rich Cohen
Author Rich Cohen was a young reporter for Rolling Stone in the early 90s when he was assigned to join the Rolling Stones on their 1994 U.S. tour in support of their album, Voodoo Lounge… rather than just a specific tour document, Cohen’s book is a well-done, candid history of the band intertwined with his personal experiences hanging out with Mick, Keith and the rest of the Stones… the great writer Ian Frazier (a personal favorite) said “this is a completely fascinating book… funny, soulful, impeccably reported, and beautifully written, (it) will be the book about the Stones that will last”...
On a side note, Cohen parlayed his friendship with Jagger into becoming one of the co-creators, along with Jagger and Martin Scorsese, of the 2016 HBO series, Vinyl… it was an over-the-top story about the 1970s music industry in New York that IMO was TERRIBLE! I see it gets a 7.7 on IMDB so what do I know! — SL