Rhythms Magazine March-April 2024

TAJ MAHAL

RICKIE LEE JONES

ELVIS COSTELLO

STEVE POLTZ

JACK JOHNSON

NEWTON FAULKNER

$15.00 inc GST

MARCH/APRIL 2024

ISSUE: 322

“I mean, having a twelve-piece band, everybody has influences that they bring to the project and it’s really great. I mean, everybody loves the diversity.”

–Su san Tedeschi

HISTORY

CHECKERBOARD LOUNGE

PLUS Ash Naylor

Samantha Fish

Ana Popovic Gallie

UPFRONT

07

08

09

The Word. Welcome to the festival season. By Brian Wise

The Sampler: Only available to subscribers and friends!

Subscribe To Rhythms. Go in the draw to win a Fender guitar!

12 Nashville Skyline. Anne McCue reports from Music City, USA on Ted Drozdowski and his new film.

BLUESFEST PREVIEW

14

BURNING DOWN THE HOUSE!

Guitarist, singer, songwriter and band member Susan Tedeschi talks to Brian Wise about the amazing Tedeschi Trucks Band back in Australia for Bluesfest and other dates and the 25th anniversary release of her breakthrough solo album Just Won’t Burn.

32 POWER PLAY

Guitar-slinger and Blues Music Award nominee, Ana Popovic is heading for Blues On Broadbeach. By Samuel J.Fell.

34 FREE FALLING

Guitarist Ash Naylor has spent the last few years in a creative frenzy, with Paul Kelly, The Church, Even and more, and now he has his own impressive solo instrumental album out. By Samuel J. Fell.

HISTORY – SOUNDS OF THE CITY

42 THE BLUES ROLLERCOASTER

Weathering the ups and downs of the past few years, Melbourne’s acclaimed Checkerboard Lounge deliver their brilliant new album. By Ian McFarlane.

44 UNSUNG HERO

Gallie is a musician you need to know about: he is a master storyteller whose songs are filled with colourful characters. By Jen Anderson.

18

20

22

24

26

28

MODERN WONDER

Blues legend Taj Mahal talks to Samuel J.Fell about his forthcoming tour and latest live album.

THE RIGHT TOWN

The irrepressible and endlessly touring Steve Poltz is back for his 22nd Australian visit that includes Bluesfest. By Samuel J. Fell.

JAZZING IT UP

Nominated for a Grammy for her latest album, Rickie Lee Jones, spoke to Brian Wise about jazz, touring and classic songwriting.

RUSTY NEVER SLEEPS

The prolific Elvis Costello has revived one of his original performance duos, Rusty, and looks forward to finally getting here again. By Brian Wise.

DANCING IN THE MOONLIGHT

Jack Johnson’s latest album includes a trademark dose of personal, social, and environmental compassion. By Brett Leigh Dicks.

THE LIGHT FANTASTIC

Newton Faulkner tells Samuel J. Fell that he is already moving onto his next project.

TOURING & NEW RELEASES

30

ALIVE & KICKING

Samantha Fish teams up with Jesse Dayton for a dynamic album that they are bringing to Blues On Broadbeach. By Samuel J.Fell.

COLUMNS

49 Musician: Profile

Madison Cunningham is an ambassador for Fender guitars.

50 Musician: Review

Joe Fulco reviews the Fender Tonemaster Pro.

51 Twang!: Denise Hylands is your Americana guide.

52

33 1/3 Revelations:

Chris Darrow’s Artist Proof. By Martin Jones

53 Lost In The Shuffle:

56

Jackie DeShannon’s Laurel Canyon. By Keith Glass

Classic Album: Buddy Holly & The Chirping Crickets. By Billy Pinnell

57 You Won’t Hear This On Radio:

58

By Trevor J. Leeden

Muscle Shoals Now!: By By Zena O’Connor

REVIEWS

60

FEATURE ALBUM REVIEWS:

Marlon Williams, Mark Seymour, Sierra Ferrell, Wesley Fuller, Madi Diaz, Rick Hart, Greg Arnold, Michael Meeking and Jo Caseley.

68 GENERAL ALBUMS

71 Blues: By Al Hensley

73

World Music & Folk: By Tony Hillier

75 Vinyl: By Steve Bell

77 Jazz: By Des Cowley

79 Books 1: The Mental As Anything Story. By Des Cowley.

80 Books Too! By Stuart Coupe

81 Festival Guide Get out your dancing gear.

82 Hello & Goodbye By Sue Barrett.

SUSAN TEDESCHI

TAJ MAHAL

RICKIE LEE JONES

ASH NAYLOR

CREDITS

Managing Editor: Brian Wise

Senior Contributor: Martin Jones

Senior Contributors: Michael Goldberg / Stuart Coupe

Design & Layout: Sally Syle - Sally’s Studio

Online Management: Robert Wise

Website/Music News: Nick Corr

Proofreading: Gerald McNamara / Des Cowley

CONTRIBUTORS

Jen Anderson

Sue Barrett

Steve Bell

Nick Corr

Des Cowley

Brett Leigh Dicks

Chris Familton

Samuel J. Fell

Joe Fulco (Musician)

Keith Glass

Al Hensley

Tony Hillier

Christopher Hollow

Denise Hylands

CONTACTS

Jeff Jenkins

Chris Lambie

Trevor J. Leeden

Anne McCue (Nashville)

Ian McFarlane (Sound of The City/History)

Zena O’Connor (Muscle Shoals)

Billy Pinnell

Jo Roberts

Michael Smith

Bernard Zuel

Advertising: admin@rhythms.com.au

Festival Coverage Contact: admin@rhythms.com.au

Rates/Specs/Deadlines: bookings@rhythms.com.au

Subscription Enquiries: subscriber@rhythms.com.au

General Enquiries: admin@rhythms.com.au

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PUBLISHER

RHYTHMS MAGAZINE PTY LTD

PO BOX 5060 HUGHESDALE VIC 3166

Printing: Spotpress Pty Ltd

Distribution: Wrapaway

AOIFE O’DONOVAN ALL MY FRIENDS

The follow-up album to the 3x GRAMMY® nominated Age of Apathy

AVAILABLE MARCH 22

Alejandro Escovedo reimagines songs from his vast catalog

AVAILABLE MARCH 29

Welcome to this special Bluesfest edition of Rhythms which continues the relationship the magazine has had with the festival for the past 31 years. We hope you enjoy the features our writers have put together on many of the artists appearing at the festival and others touring and releasing new music. You can read even more profiles and previews online at rhythms.com.au.

We are also delighted to let you know that Fender has donated a VINTERA® II ‘50S NOCASTER® (valued at $1,899) for one lucky paid-up subscriber (print or print & digital) and we will be drawing the winner in time to announce it in the July/August edition edition. This is a fantastic looking guitar; so, no matter what your level of playing you can at least look like a professional! (Just read what Grammy Award winner Madison Cunningham says about the Vintera II in our feature). Our sincerest thanks to Fender! Simply subscribe to the magazine - or if you are already a subscriber just make sure you are up to date by April 30 - then drop us a line using the link on our website as to why you would like to win the Vintera II (not more than 25 words), and we will enlist an independent judge to choose a winner.

We have now entered the season of major festivals and toursfrom Bluesfest, Port Fairy and Wilco (our January cover) in March to Broadbeach later in May - ushering in the winter months. It seems that the music industry is almost back to normal. Let’s hope that upward trend continues. But it needs you to get out there and support live music.

It has been an interesting journey for Rhythms growing up alongside Bluesfest, which arrived just a few years before the magazine but which quickly embraced it. Womadelaide arrived a month before us and there were the already established festivals such as Port Fairy and Woodford (Maleny). These days there are so many more events with different musical emphases. Just about every suburb has some sort of festival or musical event. Then there is Out On The Weekend festival in October which was prompted by the huge rise in interest in Americana, reflected in this magazine. The thing that all these events have in common is how they have evolved and changed with the times, just like we have as well. Early editions of Rhythms were heavily laden with blues. Now,

Lucinda Williams, one of our most enthusiastic readers!

by necessity of audience interests, the contents are more much diverse yet it still retains its roots origins. (John Lee Hooker is still our Patron Saint). In the same way, music festivals have evolved. Of course, you are also a much more musically educated audience and you have so much more access to music than ever before. In fact, there is probably more music available across more genres than at any other time in history…….and this is while CD sales slip, vinyl sales rise and streaming services are predominant. So, where does Rhythms fit into all this? Well, you can have as much technology as you like and as many streams as you could ever listen to, but you are still going to need a guide to show you where to go. You can’t wander out into the vast musical jungle without someone there to point you in the right direction and filter out the bad information. Otherwise, you are just going to be relying on some algorithm to tell you what to listen to and what to buy. There are literally hundreds (if not thousands) of albums released every month. Enter Rhythms.

If you are picking Rhythms up for the first time, maybe at Bluesfest, then welcome to Australia’s only national roots music magazine still in print. Welcome to your guide to what we think is great music. Nothing is definitive but we think that across the print magazine and the website we can lead you into a fabulous world of great music. Some of you might even be led out of the wilderness! Musician Jim Lauderdale defined Americana as ‘all the good stuff’. We like to think that you will find a lot of that good stuff in this magazine and at our website.

Long-time subscribers and supporters would be aware of the dwindling number of music magazines - from anywhere let alone homegrown - on newsagent shelves. Yet Rhythms has managed to stick in there like a limpet to a so-called sinking ship. There are not only many of you out there who enjoy the feel of paper but also quite enjoy reading something that is not on a screen. There are certain qualities that print has that cannot be replicated in plastic. You can even smell it! We are also well on our way to figuring out the balance between print and digital content. (We do have a music news section online). It is no idle claim to say that Rhythms is one of the longest running Australian music magazines in history. So, by becoming a subscriber to Rhythms you are not only supporting a unique publication, but you will also be enlisting your guide to good music. (You might also even win a guitar!). Until next issue….

Enjoy the music.

Brian Wise Editor

Madison Cunningham with the Fender Vintera II guitar.

HAPPY

Welcome to the Rhythms Sampler No.28 which will help you get into the festival spirit.

This year Rhythms celebrates its 32nd anniversary maintaining its reputation as one of the longest running Australian music magazines in history! The lifeblood of the magazine is comprised of loyal subscribers, some of whom have been with it from the beginning. Then there are the loyal advertisers who have helped to keep the magazine going for all these years.

You can not only help preserve this unique magazine and also receive our exclusive download card – usually available only to subscribers –but you can also go into the running for the fabulous Fender Vintera II guitar that is our subscription offer prize!

For the download card: Simply go to downloadcards.com.au and enter the code on your card (subscribers only) and you can download the tracks to your favourite device.

Thank you to all the musicians and/or record labels that have made this sampler possible.

1. About Time Business Took

Care of Me

Fiona Boyes

From Ramblified fionaboyes.com/product Rhythms’ Australian Blues Album of The Year!

2. Thank You

Mia Dyson

From: Tender Heart (Independent) sound-merch.com.au/collections/ mia-dyson

3. Cry No More

Checkerboard Lounge

From the album: Rollercoaster (Cheersquad)

4. Opelousifried

Opelousas (Kerri Simpson, Allison Ferrier, Anthony ‘Shorty’ Shorte)

From: Opelousafried Opelousas.bandcamp.com (Bare Boned Blues For FreeWheeling Minds)

5. Faker (Single)

Anna Scionti (on Bandcamp) annascionti.bandcamp.com

6. Dollar Bill Bar

Sierra Ferrell

From: Trail of Tears (Rounder Records)

7. The Revolution

Andy White

From the album: Good Luck I Hope You Make It andywhite.com

8. Keep On Truckin’

Claire Anne Taylor

From the album: Giving It Way claireannetaylor.com/store

9. All Of The Day (Single)

The Night Parrots

The latest single from Dan Warner and Marcel Borrack’s outfit. While you are at it check out Dan Warner & The Night Parrots’ 2022 album Maybe…Then danwarner.bandcamp.com

10. Alamein Line

Wesley Fuller

From: All Fuller, No Filler (Cheersquad)

11. Get To Know Me

Madi Diaz

From: Weird Faith (ANTI)

12. Sonido Cosmico Hermanos Gutierrez

From: Sonido Cosmico (Easy Eye Sound)

13. The Table

Katy Kirby

From: Blue Raspberry (ANTI)

14. Wading Through Muddy Water

8-Ball Aitken

From: Ice Cream Man 2 8ballaitken.bandcamp.com

15. Something Comes To Mind Mississippi Shakedown

From: Mississippi Shakedown, QLD mississippishakedownmusic. bandcamp.com

16. Jazz Fest Time In New Orleans Dillion James dillionjames.com

17. Bring Me Back To You (Single)

CJ Commerford & The Supertones cjsupertones.com

18. Hellfire (Single)

The Black Dakotas theblackdakotas.com

19. Loose Change Mitch Grainger mitchgrainger.com

20. Ode To Merle

The Danglin’ Brothers

From: Live At The Bowlo (Bandcamp) thedanglinbrothers.com.bandcamp.com

21. Punching Underwater

This Way North

From: Punching Underwater (Bandcamp) thiswaynorthmusic.bandcamp.com

22. Déjà Vu (Single) Lontano facebook.com/lontanoband

23. Better Ways (Single)

Tall Shaun

24. Hazel Burn

Ashley Naylor

From: Soundtracks Vol.2 ashleynayor.bandcamp.com

The perfect way to close our sampler with some superb psychedelics!

MARCH/APRIL 2024

Subscribe to Rhythms Print or Print & Digital today and you’ll get access to our Download Sampler. (Available Only To Print And Print + Digital Subscribers). You will also be able to enter the draw for our Fender Vintera II Giveaway!

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By Anne McCue

TAKE ME TO THE RIVERCOYOTE MOTEL

Ted Drozdowski has a way with words. His opening narration to the new film The River goes like this:

I grew up near a beautiful river. I fell in love with the endless, enormous flow of its waters and the way they swirled in finger-paint eddies along the shoreline where I played, digging up clay and shaping it into castles where I imagined the tugs and barges I saw go by, might dock.

The band Coyote Motel blends an old time blues sensibility with spacious, at times psychedelic jams. Their show includes a post-60s acid light show and sometimes even circus performers.

Ted shares the vocal duties with another of Nashville’s greatest treasures, Luella, who manages to channel those incandescent singers such as Jessie Mae Hemphill (particularly on the song Homegoing) and Billie Holiday - with her impeccable and soulful phrasing.

Donned in his trademark pork pie hat, Ted plays slide guitar - at times raucous, at others doleful - which is always saturated by tasteful delay and a tincture of amp distortion. The live shows are cool and entertaining, given the psychedelic jamming, the instrumentation and Ted’s frenetic slide guitar as he roams throughout the crowd. It’s a rare experience to see a band which has a real live theremin as part of its instrumentation. Needless to say, it adds an ethereal and eerie feeling to the music.

Ted’s longtime partner in love, life and music, Laurie Hoffma, is the Theremaestro.

As a child, Ted’s first musical love was country - stylings by artists such as Hank Williams and Patsy Cline - and then he discovered rock, blues, jazz and folk.

By the time I became a songwriter, I’d heard a million stories wrapped around guitars, so

my songs became stories, too. It occurred to me that most of the sounds and stories I was devoting my life to originated in the South, so I began to explore this beautiful part of America, and ultimately moved to Tennessee—a place where songs are in the air … and in the water.

John Lee Hooker - from just outside of Clarksdale, Mississippi - became a big influence and the small town became a place Ted was to visit many times over the years. If you haven’t been there you must go if you ever get to make the Southern Blues Pilgrimage.

You may have heard of Clarksdale because it is the place where, in Blues mythology, Robert Johnson sold his soul to the devil to become a great blues performer.

It is an eerie town with a lot of blues history. For instance, it is where Bessie Smith was taken when she had her fatal car accident and she died in what is now the Riverside Hotel. Home of Red’s juke joint and other treasures, Clarksdale has an atmosphere of being so timeless that time itself does not exist, a feeling that nothing has ever changed nor ever will. [Owner of Red’s, the legendary Red Paden died on December 30, 2023 aged 67].

Ted has played there many times over the years in different musical manifestations.

I love Clarkesdale - where the Sunflower River meanders through the centre of town.

In Coyote Motel’s new film, ‘the river’ is not only a watery flow but also an idea and a metaphor. It is a catalyst, a source of poetry, light and music. Of rivers, Ted says: They reflect and refract in a magical, funhouse kind of way—transforming the sunlight, the trees along their banks, the boats on their waters, and even you and I as we peer into them…

I believe in rivers. I believe they are carriers not just of water and goods and people, but of history and our humanity… Rivers, by their nature, reflect the cycle of life: birth at the headwaters and a final eddying of the current as it dissolves into the sea.

The final river in the film is the Tallahatchie and Ted tells the story of coming upon the river late one night on a road trip: The full moon looked like a lantern shrouded in damp cotton. And the river swirled like mocha as its current swept beneath us. A lone seagull cried out and then slipped back into the fog. Then, we looked down into the Tallahatchie and heard the voices of its ghosts. And this was their song.

Song: The River

Silver wings

They black the sky

And the river

Rolls on by

And those spirits

Sing their songs

Stop to listen

But move along

Coyote Motel is Ted Drozdowski on vocals, guitar and diddley bow; Sean Zywick on bass; Kyra Lachelle Curenton on drums; Luella on vocals, guitar, and percussion; Laurie Hoffma on Theremin, chimes, glockenspiel.

Ted Drozdowski is the editorial director of Premier Guitar magazine and has written for Rolling Stone, Saturday Review, Guitar World etc. He was a consultant on Martin Scorsese’s quintessential series ‘The Blues.’

The film, The River, was directed by Richie Owens. teddrozdowski.com

Susan Tedeschi. Photo by Orlando Sydney.

SHOOTING FOR THE MOON

Renowned for its live performances, the Tedeschi Trucks Band’s latest recorded project is a fourdisc, concept album. The 12-piece band is heading back to Australia spearheaded by guitarist, singer, songwriter Susan Tedeschi along with her partner, guitarist Derek Trucks. Last year Tedeschi also celebrated the 25th anniversary of her second album Just Won’t Burn. By Brian Wise

Susan Tedeschi.

Photo by Orlando Sydney.

Tedeschi Trucks Band. Photo by David McClister.

Sixty-odd years into his career, Taj Mahal is doing exactly as he’s always done, which is why he’s still here, still relevant, still so powerful, writes

Samuel J. Fell

Of all Taj Mahal’s many, many albums, my all-time favourite remains his very first. That 1968 eponymous record - which also featured a young Ry Cooder, beginning a working relationship between the two which lasts to this day – is as real and raw and alive in these modern times as it would have been back then, as the ‘60s swang and the blues re-entered the zeitgeist, informing a plethora of all else.

Mahal’s voice, even then as a twenty-six-yearold, was deep and held within its thundering timbre a knowledge, not just of life but of the music that he was set to follow from then on. He wrapped this voice around a couple of Sleepy John Estes songs, Robert Johnson’s ‘Dust My Broom’, Sonny Boy Williamson’s ‘Checkin’ Up On My Baby’, he re-arranged ‘Statesboro Blues’ and ‘EZ Rider’ and the results laid there like specks of gold in an old river bed, scooped up together to form the valuable whole. I still listen to Taj Mahal regularly; it’s simple, power rings true, which is why it’s endured, for me, to this day.

This month, fifty-five years later, Taj Mahal is about to release his fifty-third album.

The length and breadth of the man’s career cannot be underestimated, as he’s taken from the past and breathed new life into it, often incorporating within the blues’ tried and true framework myriad other roots music styles, blending and creating and striving for something new. But always, always, aware of where the music has come from, and how important it is for it to endure. “It’s the only thing to do,” he shrugs.

“At first, I didn’t realise… I knew [the music] existed out here, in terms of the way I was brought into it, but I didn’t know where the resources were,” he goes on. “But once I found the resources, I just got busy. Making sure I brought these things to the surface.”

Mahal is talking from his “family compound” in Berkley, California. He’s in what looks like a den, his phone set up on the desk in front of him, he himself leaning back in a swivel chair, pictures and photos on the walls behind

him. He sports an outrageously colourful patterned jacket, a black ball cap, Ray Bans. His beard is grizzled and grey, and his voice is low and thick and raspy. “I didn’t care about all the fame and travelling and that stuff, I just wanted to be able to play the music,” he says.

We’re talking about the survival of music, of certain types of music. I’d ventured that in order to survive, music needed to evolve, asking him whether or not he agreed, and to an extent he does – his own catalogue is example of this. However, to Mahal’s mind, not only should one reinvent, but firstly, one must showcase what the original building blocks were in the first place. “The African idea is, that you reach back behind you for a good idea, and you bring it in to the time of now. And you embellish it with what this time is, but it’s still the good idea. And that’s what keeps getting passed down the line – whether it’s a great song, a great style, just keep passing it down the line.”

Again, his own extensive catalogue is evidence of this – taking the original good idea, embellishing it, and putting it out there so’s people know; they know where it came from, and thanks to Mahal’s musical nous, they also know where it can go Where it’s been most recently, is Tulsa, Oklahoma, the setting for the man’s fiftythird record, a live album, Swingin’ Live At The Church In Tulsa. Recorded at The Church, the base of musical operations of the late Leon Russell – a long-time friend of Mahal’s – the album is a tribute of sorts to both Russell and also Tulsa, and its African-American cultural heritage, which as Mahal says, was instrumental in his career beginning; “Leon was a very good friend of mine, and the Tulsa and Oklahoma musicians were the ones who helped set me on the map with the first three albums.

“So, it’s coming back and paying my respects to somebody who was really a phenomenal musician and a great friend.” The album sees Mahal fronting a sextet, which includes his long-time bassist and drummer Bill Rich and Kester Smith, along with Hawaiian lap steel player Bobby Ingano, dobro player Ron Ickes and guitarist and vocalist Trey Hensley. It sees him sit down and start to play. And it acts as a calling card from where Taj Mahal is right now, which is to say, deep within the heart and soul of American music. And not just American music, of course, that’s the foundation, the “good idea” – the embellishments are pure Taj; soul, reggae, Latin and Caribbean, West African, jazz and Cajun, Calypso and gospel. Wherever he feels like going, is where he goes. “I don’t use a set list,” he half smiles.

Prior to this album, just last year, he released Savoy, another tribute, this one to the Savoy

Ballroom which, back in the 1920s, ‘30s, ‘40s and ‘50s was the “heartbeat of Harlem” in NYC, where Mahal was born. Savoy is another example of this multi-faceted artist mining the depths of music, a big band swing album made in collaboration with producer John Simon (Leonard Cohen, The Band, et al), another with whom Mahal has enjoyed a long friendship. “We’d talked about it… we’d had lots of conversations about it,” Mahal says on the concept of a big band record.

“The thing was, to find a suitable record company to put the music out, just like we wanted it, and it turned out to be Stony Plain,” he explains. “And it turned out to be quite nice. We ended up with a long-list of fifty-eight songs, and so we just picked tunes that I personally remember hearing seventy, seventy-five years ago, in my parent’s collection. And as I say, great tunes that need to have a new… blow some new life in them, again.”

It doesn’t matter what Taj Mahal is doing, or where he’s doing it, because what he’s doing is always the same, even if it sounds completely different. His musical mission has been to bring the music forth. It doesn’t matter the music – bring forth the good idea, present it as it should be, and then show where it can go. This, he loves. “People don’t pay me for the music,” he’s been quoted as saying. “They pay me for what it takes me to get there – I would gladly play music for free if I could be heard.”

He tells me a story that sums up how, for him, what he does is so important. “The last time I was [in Australia], one of the places I played was in Perth. And a man flew down from up above, from Broome, all the way down to Perth, he said ‘just to hear a guy sit and play a guitar like he’s sittin’ on his front porch’. He and his wife spent money and time to come down – I ran into them at a restaurant, [and they told me]. He told me how much they enjoyed it.”

We finish up our phone call, talk briefly about his upcoming shows at the Byron Bay Bluesfest. “We’ve got a little surprise comin’ for you when we get over there,” he says with a grin. I ask if he can give a hint. “Mmmmm, no, no hint. But I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised.”

It is, in true Taj Mahal style, an example of the man never quite being done. There’s always something else, another great idea, to be embellished, and presented to people for the pure and unadulterated enjoyment of the music.

Taj Mahal plays the Byron Bay Bluesfest, March 28 – April 1. For other dates, see the gig Guide. Savoy is available now via Stony Plain Records. Swingin’ Live At The Church In Tulsa is available March 8 via Lightning Rod Records.

Steve Poltz by Jeff Fansano

As he hits the road on a six-month run, Steve Poltz is ready for anything, as he tells Samuel J. Fell

Steve Poltz is many things – he’s emo, he’s screamo, he’s country and he’s folk, Americana if you wanna, he’s old-fashioned but he’s woke, he’s everything to everyone, he’s Jesus and he’s Buddha too, but don’t panic because he’s organic and too scared to be satanic. But mostly, he’s just here to sing for you – as he does indeed sing on ‘Wrong Town’, the opener to his 2022 album Stardust and Satellites, and singing to you is what he is truly best at.

Over a career spanning decades, encompassing some fourteen albums, Poltz has made an art of spinning the everyday into gold, little nuggets that sit alongside one another on these records, most (if not all) of varying styles – indeed, Stardust and Satellites presents as a metaphorical ‘day in the life’, whereby different feelings and moods and speeds and styles and observations go into making up the whole. Poltz, who for the past eight years has been based in Nashville, is nothing if not prolific, and so he’s already moving on to the next project, although as he says, it’s never easy at first.

“I’m not organised, it’s a mess in my brain,” he confesses. “Right now, I’m sitting on probably sixty songs of which I need to pare down to about ten to make a record, and I’m sorta having a hard time getting it down to what I want.”

He goes on to say that he just constantly writes, and then starts “looking for some sort of theme, or maybe the only theme is that there isn’t a theme,” he laughs. “But I know I don’t overthink it, it’s not that important.” Poltz, as he goes about penning songs (he tells me he’s written “a few” in the past couple of days alone), obviously trusts it all to come together – he’s been here before, after all.

As he waits for this to happen, Poltz is about to hit the road – his schedule, listed on his website, sees him on said road pretty much up until the middle of the year, a run which includes a number of shows here in Australia (culminating at the Byron Bay Bluesfest, a festival he played last year), after a run through the US with fellow singer-songwriter, Tupelo, Mississippi’s Paul Thorn, whom Poltz has known for years. “There’s a cruise ship we’ve both done a lot, called Cayamo… which is a singersongwriter cruise,” he explains. “We played Cayamo and do shows together… we did a show where we were on stage together, just kinda shootin’ the shit, he’d do a song, I’d do a song. We had so much fun, we said we should do a tour like this, so our agents put it together. He was a boxer, so we’re calling it In The Ring Together.”

On touring, Poltz has many stories, one of his best being when he was a part of Jewel’s band, which played second to last on the final night of the ill-fated (to put it mildly) Woodstock ’99, where everything went to hell and the crowd rioted and burned the joint to the ground. “We went on [after Elvis Costello] and sang and people were going nuts,” he laughs. “And then they started calming down because Jewel’s singing pretty songs and it sorta quelled the riot activity, but then the last band on after us was the Red Hot Chili Peppers,” Poltz pauses to laugh. “So (bassist) Flea goes onstage naked, doesn’t even have a sock over his dick… we were talking to him before they went on, telling him it was nuts out there, and it was so funny, because where do you look when you’re talking to Flea? His dick or his eyes?

Anyway, they went on… flames erupted everywhere, people are kicking shit over –we got on our tour bus and got the hell outta there. It was nutso mcgutso.”

It’s fair to say, and no doubt Poltz is hoping so, that there won’t be any fires or riots at any point during his six-month run from here to July. Or maybe there will be – one thing Poltz knows of touring, is that he has no idea what to expect. “I start tomorrow, fly up to Michigan, so I’m filled with a bit of trepidation because I know I’m about to enter into the maelstrom of activity, a whirlwind of non-stop planes, trains and automobiles.”

He pauses, then smiles. “But if I just do it one gig at a time, then I get high from the gigs, and that’s [great].”

Steve Poltz plays the Byron Bay Bluesfest, March 28 – April 1. For full tour schedule, see the Gig Guide.

heading to Australia with her Grammy-nominated album Pieces of Treasure. By Brian

Rickie Lee Jones by Aston Morgan.

Rickie Lee Jones is

Wise

Last year when we spoke to Rickie Lee Jones about her beautiful Russ Titelman produced jazz album Pieces of Treasure she wasn’t feeling embraced by the larger jazz community. Festival and club bookings, especially jazz ones, didn’t seem to be rolling in and she wasn’t feeling the love.

While Jones did go back to Los Angeles to play the famous Troubadour she notes that it was “not the club it was; it doesn’t even have seats anymore!”

A lot can happen in a year. A 2024 Grammy nomination for Best Traditional Pop Vocal album – 44 years after her first of two wins - for one thing! This year, Jones is bubbling enthusiasm and her voice reflects a lot of the bon temps roulez spirit that you find everywhere in the city of New Orleans, where she has lived for over a decade.

Pieces of Treasure is Jones’ 14th studio album in an extraordinary career that has seen her not only pen some unforgettable songs - including what has become embraced as almost our own national anthem ‘Horses’ - but also produce albums as adventurous in their concept, production and instrumentation as some of Joni Mitchell’s work.

There are also previous albums of delightful and revealing interpretations, such as Kicks in 2019, It’s Like This (2000) and Pop Pop in 1991, with their stellar cast of musicians. (Jones also released a great rendition of ‘Friday On My Mind’ as an EP track in 1989. (Maybe someone can request it on her forthcoming tour here).

“All those outside disappointments didn’t matter at all,” says Jones when we meet on Zoom, “because on stage the music was the best I’ve ever had. Maybe the first tour was, but it’s hard to say. I was so intoxicated from being on stage, but it was such incredible music that we played that it didn’t matter if anything was going off behind the scenes. This music was so beautiful that I walked off stage every night going, ‘I’m so happy to still be working’. That’s the truth. That’s the amazing thing.”

“As wonderful as it is to win,” she says of the fact that her latest album was nominated in Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album category (Laufey’s Bewitched won), “getting nominated has been so wonderful and seeing people feel so glad on my behalf. I think Russ Titelman did such an amazing job with this record that he definitely deserved a nomination as well. So, I’m going to carry this nomination for both of us.”

“It’s been happy and fun,” she enthuses from her home in New Orleans, just outside the French Quarter. It is almost like a dark cloud has lifted from Jones since the last time we spoke. Then she was worried about the success of her album, having put so much work into it and garnered such positive reviews. Her amazing memoir, Last Chance Texaco: Chronicles of An American Troubadour, had also been recently published and she had been busy talking about that. It was serious stuff.

Now, Jones is excited about the superb ensemble she is bringing to Australia. Ben Rosenblum is on electric piano and accordion. (“He’s young and very extraordinary. He’s got a lot of heart”). Mike Dillon, who she has been working with for the past seven years is on percussion. Kai Welch, from Nashville, is on guitar (“He’s got a little bit of that strong folk-rock thing”). Adding to the excitement Jones adds that she might also be able to bring singer Petra Haden, one of the daughters of the great Charlie Haden (“An incredible singer, violinist, and nice to be with”). Haden has worked a lot with guitarist Bill Frisell. Jones has been getting rave reviews for her shows highlighting the latest album, so we are in for something special. “I’ll mix it up,” says Jones when I ask her about the probable setlists for the Australian shows.

Jones’ musical taste is what might be called catholic. Just look at some of the songwriters she has previously chosen to interpret: John Lennon, Becker & Fagen, Marvin Gaye, Jimi Hendrix, Elton John & Bernie Taupin and more. On the other hand, she has delved back into the great American songbook, occasionally on earlier albums but in a concentrated fashion for Pieces of Treasure

As we have spoken about previously, Jones and Russ Titelman chose songs such as ‘Just In Time’, ‘Nature Boy’, ‘They Can’t Take That Away From Me’, ‘On The Sunny Side of The Street’, ‘It’s All In The Game’, ‘One

For My baby (and One More For The Road)’ and more. No matter how young you are it would have been hard to have avoided at least a few of these classics. But where did Jones first hear the songs?

“Well, a lot of ‘em come from my dad,” she admits. It is something with which many of us can probably identify. “I probably heard him around the house but he sat down and taught me a few of ‘em when I was eight or nine. What would that be like? ‘Sunnyside Of The Street’ and ‘Grab Your Coat And Get Your Hat.’ Actually, I have a recording of him and my Uncle Bob playing that song! It occurred to me just this week that I should put that on the internet so people can hear it. So, that’s a really old one in the family. I heard ‘Just In Time’ from The Rat Pack guys, maybe Frank [Sinatra]. So, it’s a mix of when I was a teenager or from my dad or one or two that were new to me.”

I imagine that Jones might have also incorporated some of these songs into her sets when she first started playing coffee houses in Los Angeles. What was she playing then?

“If it was a solo gig, no,” she replies. “I just didn’t know how to play jazz. I learned to play a couple of Dan Hicks songs and he would’ve been a great teacher of how to play jazz guitar, rhythm jazz guitar. But I didn’t have any experience with chords and how to do substitute chords or anything like that. But if I was sitting in with a band like at the Comeback Inn in Venice Beach or something like that, then I would’ve sung ‘My Funny Valentine’ or ‘Since I Fell For You’ or even ‘Lush Life’.”

Those are songs that come from an era of great songwriting. Does Jones think that type of songwriting exists anymore? Or is it that we just don’t get to hear them?

“The real question you’re asking is, are people writing great songs?” responds Jones, “and that’s a question in any ilk. Is anybody writing a song we’ll remember or that we want to sing when we’re getting out of the shower? There was an innocence and a naivety to the music - 900,000 songs ago! They’ve written so many songs between then and now and those were the songs. There wasn’t a whole bunch of extraneous music. So, you have to dig through a lot of stuff to find it. I think I met one writer – Vilray Bolles [guitarist] - but I think there must be more people trying to write in that ilk.

“Remember though, it’s an evolution. So, the jazz music from 1964 is an evolution from the jazz music of 1948. So, it’s the newest hippest, slickest it can be, and it has those clothes on when it comes out. I’m talking about the song, not the singer. Now, people would be looking back and trying to imitate it and so it would always have a nostalgia about it. Things are of their time. But I don’t like nostalgia, artistic nostalgia.”

Which brings me to the question of whether Jones is writing new songs. “I am writing such incredible material,” she enthuses. “Oh my God!

Every day I write three more songs on my phone. I used to have a goal to learn improvisation in performance. So, the goal now is - it’s not to deconstruct but it’s to write things that aren’t limited to the two-verse bridge verse out. That’s not easy. That’s how I grew up. I’m a Beatle girl but I’ve been finding ways into what I guess might feel more natural in theatre. So, I’ve been moving towards that. So, some of what I’ve written is traditional in a way but some of the stuff I’m coming up with is very new to me. But all of them are three quarters of a song. I’m very good with three quarters of a song. But bringing it in all the way? We’ll see what I can do.”

Also, is there a second volume of her memoir on the way?

“There is!” confirms Jones. “I was just working on a story today. The form of it is different. So, that was telling parts of many different episodes so that the book would keep moving and not go down any one rabbit hole. But there are particular stories I’d like to tell more of as well as some brand-new stories. So, this one I think would almost be more like short stories. But yes, I am excited to write more stories about my life.”

Rickie Lee Jones is appearing at Bluesfest and also performing in Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney.

As if Elvis Costello wasn’t prolific enough, he has even delved back into the dim, distant past to revisit an obscure duo he was in when he was just 18 years of age! By

Brian Wise

Elvis Costello will finally return to Australia this month for a Bluesfest appearance and a series of shows that were due to happen last year but were postponed due to the ubiquitous Covid. Since then, he has been touring constantly, even appearing at the Museum of Natural History in New York for a fundraiser. In fact, most of this year is going to be taken up with touring, either with his band (often featuring Charlie Sexton) or as a duo with Steve Nieve in the northern autumn.

“I take that view of everything that’s at my disposal and I’ve tried to make myself think a little harder in advance, so that I can be at ease in the moment that I’m not shortchanging the audience and I’m actually bringing the selection of the best songs,” replies Costello when I ask him what we can expect from the set lists this time around.

“I’ve written some of them very familiar to you, some of them not so familiar in my experience of the recent shows. Some of the numbers that got the most vociferous response were in fact songs that I wouldn’t think were among the better known but for whatever reason they hit a nerve with the audience. So, that’s a good sign. I think trusting your instincts in that way is good.” While Costello might not have a new album out with The Imposters – and late last year he was celebrating the Hal Leonard publication of the score of The Juliet Letters for the Brodsky Quartet’s 30th Anniversary Edition –he has found time over the past year to revisit his past on a project of which probably only ardent fans would have been aware. You can always rely on Elvis Costello to be working on something that piques one’s interest.

In May 2022, Costello released the album Rusty: The Resurrection of Rust, based on songs he played 50 years ago as D.P.McManus with his old bandmate Allan Mayes. This certainly pre-dates the first time I ever heard

Costello when Charlie Gillett played some of the D.P. McManus demos on the revered Radio London program Honky Tonk

According to Costello the Rusty album is “the record we would have cut when we were 18, if anyone had let us.” It features six songs from the band’s 1972 set lists, including: ‘Surrender to the Rhythm’ and ‘Don’t Lose Your Grip on Love’ written by Nick Lowe while he was in Brinsley Schwarz; ‘I’m Ahead If I Can Quit While I’m Behind’ by eccentric American songwriter Jim Ford (also a favourite of Lowe’s); a medley of Neil Young’s ‘Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere’ and ‘Dance, Dance, Dance’; and, two originals titled ‘Warm House’ and ‘Maureen and Sam’.

Costello had apparently been playing five or six nights a week while he was at school but once he got a job as a computer operator the Rusty gigs revolved around his shift work –until he left Liverpool for London in early 1973. Five years later he released his debut album My Aim Is True – the first of 32 albums so far - but that seminal experience with Rusty has obviously a fond place in his heart.

Of course, the difference between Rusty then and now is that more than a half a century on both Costello and Mayes are obviously far more accomplished. They are also assisted by members of Costello’s band, as well as Bob Andrews, an original member of Brinsley Schwarz (on ‘Surrender To The Rhythm’). So, this is way ahead of what a demo might have sounded like had it been made back in 1973. In fact, it is not only quite charming but you can also see how this is the sound of the great pub rock era of the early to mid’70s, pioneered by the Brinsleys in London. At the very least, it is partial vindication of my long-time reverence for Brinsley Schwarz, the band, and Nick Lowe, the writer.

When I ask Costello how the resurrection of Rusty came about, he admits that it was Allan Mayes who reminded him of the

50th anniversary of their collaboration and suggested they record some songs and release them on a cassette.

“There’s a couple of things wrong with that idea,” Costello told his friend. “One is that the cassette is not the most common form of communication anymore and some of those friends are not around. So, maybe we should just make the record that we would’ve made at 17 and 18 when we first met. So, we did. We just cut an EP with the Imposters backing us and it was great fun to do.

“So, we cut a couple of songs from those days, a couple of my earlier songs and a couple of Nick Lowe songs that I think we were quite happy to let people believe we had written when we did our shows because the songs weren’t terribly well known, and a couple of Neil Young tunes that we jammed together in an arrangement. It was really a great thing. Then Allan came and played with the imposters in New York. We did a festival appearance in San Francisco and Golden Gate Park [Hardly Strictly] and we did The Tonight Show together and we were on the bill with Madonna - so it was lucky that we practiced our dance steps before we did it!”

Costello points out that he and Mayes share lead and harmony vocals on Jim Ford’s ‘I’m Ahead If I Can Quit While I’m Behind’, a title that typifies the sense of humour of a writer who was a friend of Sly Stone and whose songs were also recorded by Aretha Franklin and Bobby Womack.

“Nick had done Jim’s songs in the Brinsley’s and, also in Rockpile, performed ‘Ju Ju Man’ and ‘36 Inches High’,” he explains. “One of my favourites is a song that Bobby Womack recorded, which I cut for a television series called Vinyl. It’s a song called ‘Point of Return’. Of course, he also wrote ‘Harry Hippie’, which Womack recorded and had a big hit on.

“So, I mean I’ve always been a fan of that kind of soul balladry, I suppose you call it. They were kind of R&B ballads where all the words mean different things to different people now depending on their generation. But I think of the most country soul kind of style like Donnie Fritz, that kind of music. Jim Ford came out of Kentucky and was a really good songwriter. It’s not a surprise that Sly recognised the guy as well.

“The songs have really unusual lyrics and that’s what I like.

You’re the biggest chocolate covered liar I’ve ever seen. [‘Point of No Return’].

It’s a funny way of saying, ‘Did you eat the cake?’ He just had a thing that would stick out.

I’d like to help a man when he’s down /But I can’t help him much when he’s sleeping on the ground / Sorry, Harry, think I’m gonna put you down.

But it’s not a put down line. It’s a sad line really because it’s somebody who won’t lift themselves up. You get the feeling that that was a comment on people being too stoned to care or something. That was a true line, I think.”

While 2023 eventually proved to be productive for Costello once he overcame the postponement of the Australian tour and missing Bluesfest, there was also sadness when two of his idols passed away within six months of each other: Burt Bacharach with whom he had worked closely and Tony Bennett, whose 80th birthday celebration Costello had sung at.

“It’s hard to imagine the world without him,” says Costello of Bennett, “but we’re fortunate to have spent some good evenings together and shared the stage with him on a number of occasions. My wife [Diana Krall], of course, made the second to last record that he made. I think that’s a beautiful, very intimate record of Gershwin songs that they recorded, which

is incredible. He remained in great voice to his last performance. He just had a supernatural kind of quality, really something very great.”

In tribute to Burt Bacharach, Costello has released a 4-CD box set that includes the songs they wrote together, along with Costello’s versions of some of Bacharach’s favourite other compositions.

“I tried to find all the words that I could say on that topic, and I put them into the essay that was in the box,” says Costello of his friend and mentor. “I wanted to put everything that I had to say to tell the story of somebody’s compositions I had known before I knew his name. I knew the songs; I heard them sung on the radio and on television when I was just a child. Then throughout the sixties, of course, like everybody I heard all the songs that became really associated with Dionne Warwick and all the other singers that sang his songs, like Aretha Franklin and Tom Jones and Dusty Springfield and so on and so forth. Then, in later years, my wife’s recording of the ‘Look of Love’ is probably the other famous version of that song after Dusty’s original from Casino Royale. To think that we worked for nearly 30 years on songwriting together is remarkable to me!”

While we mourn the loss of greats such as Bennett and Bacharach, there is one hero of

Costello’s that he saw only the night before we spoke: Bob Dylan. In fact, it was the fourth time that Costello saw him on that leg of his tour late last year. (Of course, Costello’s band includes guitarist Charlie Sexton, who spent years with Dylan).

“I want to see it again because it’s kind like going to see a play multiple times because the text of each song is so rich,” explains Costello, the music fan. “There’s something I think you get from hearing the different emphasis that’s placed on it in different nights. I find that very fascinating. I’m fortunate to have the opportunity to right now be finished with my touring. I’m working on some other things but I’m at home base for a few days.”

“I saw the Rolling Stones from about 30 feet away,” he adds of the New York club show promoting the latest album Hackney Diamonds. “I didn’t ever expect to see the Rolling Stones at a club. I mean, my family home in the Sixties was about a quarter of a mile away from the Station Hotel but I was way too young to go there when the stars were playing there in Richmond. I never thought I’d ever see the Stones up so close, and they were just great. It was a short appearance to announce the release of their new record, but it was in a great spirit and people really enjoyed it.”

Elvis Costello by Mark Seliger.

Byron Bay Bluesfest holds a special place in the heart of Hawaiian singer songwriter Jack Johnson. Prior to his first Bluesfest appearance in 2001, Johnson had previously visited Australia several times as a surfer and filmmaker, but his return to these shores for his debut performance at the iconic festival came with a degree of deliberation. After pondering whether to write ‘filmmaker’ or ‘musician’ as his occupation on his Incoming Passenger Card when landing in Australia, Johnson decided to take ownership of his career shift and put down the latter. That ownership subsequently extended to the Byron Bay stage, so much so that festival organisers invited him back the following year as a headline act.

“That first Bluesfest was the biggest crowd we’d ever played in front of,” recalled Johnson during a recent interview with Rhythms Magazine. “Everyone there was really supportive because I think they knew I was one of them. I’d seen a lot of those people in the water over the years, both in Australia and also when they had travelled to Hawaii. So, I think it was like ‘yeah, one of our surfer buddies made it’ - I definitely felt that kind of support. To this day, whenever we play Australia, it feels like a hometown show.

“In the months leading up to that first time at Bluesfest I’d been touring with Ben Harper, and it was one of those things where I was constantly pinching myself that we on a plane touring all around the place with Ben and his band. I was the rookie on the team and was so excited just to be there. Then we went to Australia and I’ve got to say there was a little bit of pride because when we got down there, Ben was asking me where to go and what to do. He knew I could get some boards together and that I knew where the best waves were and could take everybody surfing. It was then me playing older brother to Ben.” Johnson returns to Australia this month to play Bluesfest, his second visit on the back of his latest album Meet the Moonlight. Although it’s his first new album in over five years, Meet the Moonlight follows in the footsteps of previous releases with the motivation for Johnson making a new album being as straightforward as accumulating enough songs he was happy with. Having previously worked with Brazilian producer Mario Caldato Jr. across several of his past albums, this time around Johnson wanted to try something different and turned to lauded Los Angeles-based musician and producer, Blake Mills.

“I really loved that Alabama Shakes record he did,” Johnson explained of Mills. “When I listen to a record, I don’t know if I’m always able to hear the production compared to the songs, but that was actually one album where I noticed whatever production choices were being made and I really liked them. They’re a band I really like, and I thought that was a really cool way to approach things tonally.

“Because Blake produced that Alabama Shakes album and some of his own music that I liked, I thought it would be worth to talking to him

and we really hit it off. Before we even started talking about contracts, he said why don’t we just sit in a room together and make some music and see if we like it. We did that and halfway through the week there was some tension there and we weren’t sure, but once we found our comfort zone it gelled, and we decided to make an album together and have since become really good friends.”

With Mills on board for the album’s production, the first round of recording took place at Sound City Studios in Los Angeles – the facility that gave birth to iconic albums by everyone from Johnny Cash to Elton John and U2 - before production moved to The Mango Tree, Johnson’s home studio on the island of O’ahu in Hawaii. Like all fruitful collaborations, the process of making Meet the Moonlight was a learning experience for both Johnson and Mills alike.

“I’m kind of used to working with people in the studio who mostly help me get to where I want to go and I never really had somebody who challenged me as much as he did,” Johnson explained. “The first week I went over to Sound City where he works and was in his comfort zone and had all his palette there to draw from. We would come up with something together that wasn’t what I thought we would do, and it was really exciting to hear that.

“Then we came over to Hawaii to finish the album and that was kind of fun because we were in my zone and comfort spot and taking breaks and going swimming every day. It was fun to watch him slowly become tanner and start laying back and being like ‘I get it, let’s slow the bpm down a little bit and take away the distortion pedal.’ He told me at one point, which was nice, that he learned there are more ways to make a record than he thought.”

While Johnson found the collaborative experience of working with Mills across the album’s production creatively formative, Meet the Moonlight still comes with a trademark dose of personal, social, and environmental compassion. True to Johnson’s creative ethos, it’s a very empathetic record.

“You hit the nail on the head because if I had to pick a word that people, including myself, could use to meditate or focus on, it’s empathy,” Johnson said. “Those songs came during that time when the pandemic was happening and there was a lot of division on how to handle things and social media was a big part of how we were all communicating. I started realizing there was a real chance of losing some friends through that time so even if we didn’t agree on things, I had a goal of keeping all my friends and I tried to do more listening.” A large part of Johnson’s empathy and appreciation for the world around him and those who are part of it no doubt stems from his upbringing.

Born and raised on the North Shore of O’ahu, Johnson started surfing when he was five years old. At the age of 17, he became the youngest invitee to make the finals of the Pipeline Masters. After an accident put his professional surfing aspirations on hold, Johnson moved to Santa Barbara, California - home of the modern-day environmental movement - to study filmmaking at the University of California Santa Barbara. Already a proficient guitarist, it was while living in the city’s college community of Isla Vista that Johnson joined his first band. His early professional undertakings saw Johnson making surf films and music, both of which channelled his insightful sense of compassion and understanding. But, as songwriting came to the fore, Johnson quickly learned how to walk the fine line between addressing an issue and preaching about it.

“I never want to sound preachy and whenever a song has any kind of a message, it’s because I’m trying to remind myself of that thing,” Johnson mused. “I don’t know if I have the confidence to ever feel like I know exactly what everybody else should be doing or providing that information. Usually, the songs for me are questions. Sometimes I answer the question in the process of writing it but more often than not the song remains a question. Sometimes the thing that feels good about hearing a song is to know somebody else has these things on their minds too.

“Blues music feels good because you’re reminded that others are going through the blues and its comforting to hear that. I realised at some point along the way that when I would hear a really good song it would connect with something in my mind that I had already thought about but hadn’t been able to articulate. When I heard a really good line from a Greg Brown song for instance, I would just think ‘there it is, that’s what I was thinking but I couldn’t put into words.’ I guess what I’m trying do with my songs is to comfort people.”

“Stuff is happening,” Newton Faulkner beams, “good stuff.” He’s sitting in his home studio, headphones on and a large mic in front of him, chatting with Rhythms via the wonders of modern technology; which can’t be said for things on my end – I can see him, but he can only hear me. “I’m trying to think what you look like, with a voice like that,” he laughs, as I lament my lack of a working camera. I tell him I have a large, red beard to which he chuckles, scratching his own, far neater ginger chin.

The reason Faulkner and I are chatting on a Wednesday morning is because, of course, the English roots-tinged singer-songwriter is once again heading our way for a string of shows, culminating in another appearance at the Byron Bay Bluesfest, a place where he feels right at home. “Oh yeah, every time I’ve done [Bluesfest], it’s been one of my favourite gigs of the whole year.”

“And the line-up every time I’ve done it has been mind-blowing,” he goes on. “I haven’t looked at it this year yet, partly because I find it really intimidating.” He laughs, adding, “it’s that mixture of people that I kinda know from around the place that are meant to be really good, and then other people who just stone-cold legends… it’s always amazing.”

Faulkner is, if nothing else, humble. For while he certainly wouldn’t put himself in the Stone-Cold Legend category, he’s certainly earnt his spot on those big stages. Since the mid-2000s, as a raw and dreadlocked young bloke with a single guitar, Faulkner has cemented his spot among the nu-roots luminaries that came to be around the turn of the century, gaining momentum as that decade wore on. A prolific releaser of albums, he’s released seven in the past fifteen-odd years, each one an exploration into various styles contained under the roots umbrella: lashings of the blues, of folk, of soul and rock ‘n’ roll thrown in and mixed up, the results garnering Faulkner fans across the globe.

His latest, released mid-pandemic in 2021, was Interference (Of Light), and it’s from this album that Faulkner is spring-boarding into his next project. We talk briefly about how he’s wanted to change things up in terms of stripping things back, then trying something which involves multiple layers, really experimenting in the studio in order to come out with something new – as it stands now, he’s doing both. “I am kinda doing both at the same time,” he confirms.

“I’m doing something very acoustic-focused, and also taking the production way further than I ever have before. Partly because… just before we started making [Interference (Of Light)], we talked about it being very collaborative and getting loads of producers in, and that was very much the plan… but obviously then the c-word happened, so that meant I wasn’t allowed to work on it. So it was me, just me,” he laughs. “And there was no time frame, the world was shut, just get on with it!”

He talks then, of how he then had all this time in which to make the album, time to “really get my head into what it is that makes me love a record”. As such, Faulkner feels he has more of a handle on how to make a record now, than he ever has done before. “I feel like music has no rules,” he muses, “at the moment. At all. There’s nothing that’s inherently uncool or whatever, it’s the total wild west, there are no rules. And I must admit, I think writing-wise, things are leaning in a direction I can really get on board with, and that comes and goes over the years.”

And so, the project, the album he’s currently working on, while he’s not yet able to offer too much insight into what it is exactly, is looking to make up for the lack of collaboration born through Covid, while making use of what he learned at the same time – a lot of collaboration, but done in a way that produces an album that Newton Faulkner is very much happy with, and one which sounds different to anything he’s done before. Which, to be honest, is how he’s tried to do it since he began, a decade and a half ago.

“The thing for me, is to just continue doing what I feel most passionate about, and from there we’ll see where we land,” he laughs.

Newton Faulkner plays the Byron Bay Bluesfest, March 28 – April 1. For other dates, see the Gig Guide.

ALIVE AND KICKING!

Collaborating with Jesse Dayton, Samantha Fish has veered left and produced her most exciting album yet, writes Samuel J.

Fell.

Samantha Fish is on the road when I call her. For Fish, ‘on the road’ is a natural place, a place where she’s spent a great deal of time since releasing her debut album, Live Bait, in 2009, and so it should come as no surprise that that’s where she is, whiling away the time chatting to the likes of me between cities.

However, in this instance, she’s not on her way to a gig – she’s actually heading from her home in New Orleans to Gulfport in Mississippi, not to wield her guitar and strut her rock ‘n’ roll blues chops, but for a wardrobe fitting. She laughs, knowing it’s not what I, nor she if truth be told, was expecting. “I’m on my way to a wardrobe fitting for the Grammys,” she smiles. “As you do!” As you do indeed, but it’s certainly not to be overlooked. It’s for Fish’s new record, Death Wish Blues, a collaboration with fellowguitarist Jesse Dayton, that the Grammy nomination has been bestowed, in the Best Contemporary Blues Album category. Fish and I talk a few days before the ceremony, and at time of writing, it can be reported that Fish and Dayton’s record didn’t take out the gong, but it shouldn’t lessen the achievement – for Death Wish Blues is a solid record: not merely a contemporary blues album, but one with a heavy attitude, a swagger and a sweat about it. A tour de force, fitting for these two stellar players.

“The idea for [this album] had been floating around the ether of my camp for a few years,” she explains on the origins of the

album and the Dayton collaboration. “The terms we’d put to it were, like, ‘side-project’ or ‘something different’, to coincide with our solo careers, but I had this vision for this aesthetic and a style of an album that would be a departure from what I do… something to kinda shock people. [Jesse] and I had known each other for a long time… I was always a fan, but I went and saw him [in early 2022] and a lightbulb went off, I thought he’d be so perfect for this project, because it’d be a departure for both of us.”

Dayton, who of course maintains a solid solo career of his own (his solo debut, Raisin’ Cain in 1995 topped a number of Americana charts), is also renowned for collaborations with Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings, as well as stints in punk band X, plus the scoring of a number of movies, most notably for horror film director / White Zombie frontman Rob Zombie. He’s no slouch and is certainly not one to shy away from something new, something designed to shock – and so he jumped on board for Death Wish Blues “Yeah, it was pretty easy to convince him,” Fish laughs. “Here’s the thing about Jesse, he’s such a chameleon too. That’s what drew me to him, he has a lot going on – not only does he have a really great solo career, but he’s backed some of the most legendary country outlaw icons, and punk rock icons. He’s in rock ‘n’ roll, country… he’s diverse. So, to ask him to do something like this, it’s totally up his alley because he’s certainly somebody who likes to take left turns like I do.”

Death Wish Blues is a thumper of an album. It seems like a beast possessed of multiple limbs which it thrashes about as it lumbers along, and yet it’s sleek and its movements seem effortless. A great deal of this (aside, of course, from the incendiary playing of both our protagonists) can be attributed to the album’s producer, the master of multi-legged, blues-infused rock ‘n’ roll, Jon Spencer. “Bringing in Jon Spencer, I felt like that was a beautiful idea,” Fish enthuses.

“I mean, Jon is an amazing artist himself, and I was always a fan of what he did with RL Burnside, bringing together these two genres, creating something really wild, and I felt that that would be what we needed. So that’s how it started, and we kept writing and got into the studio fairly quickly.”

By all accounts, Death Wish Blues did indeed come together fairly quickly once all these important pieces were in place, and for Fish, whether it won a Grammy or not, it’s a great piece of work of which she’s understandably proud. “Oh yeah, the songs, they’re always exciting to listen to,” she smiles. “The way they’re mixed, sonically, it’s like you have stuff coming from the left, and the right –it’s just like confetti going off all the time as you’re listening.”

Samantha Fish and Jesse Dayton will play Blues On Broadbeach, May 16-19. For all other tour dates, see the Gig Guide. Death Wish Blues is available now via Rounder Records.

Jesse Dayton and Samantha Fish. Photo by Jean Frank.

MELISSA ETHERIDGE (USA) (USA)

SAMANTHA FISH & JESSE DAYTON

ANA POPOVIC (USA) ERIC BIBB (USA)

JON CLEARY & THE ABSOLUTE MONSTER GENTLEMEN (USA)

LLOYD SPIEGEL DALLAS FRASCA CHASE THE SUN

ALL STAR BLUES JAM HI RHYTHM SECTION WITH BOO MITCHELL (USA)

8 BALL AITKEN & FRIENDS

16–19 MAY, 2024 GOLD COAST GATHERING ON KOMBUMERRI LAND & MANY MORE

KU AWA P K SU AY CKET

FAT FREDDY’S DROP

TIJUANA CARTEL BOOMCHILD PLUS GUESTS

(NZ)

POWER UP

Ana Popovic has always brought the power, but via her latest record, she’s taking it to a whole new level, writes Samuel J. Fell.

Guitar-slinger Ana Popovic is on the high seas when she calls in. I have visions of cutlasses and main sails, perhaps the odd plank-walking, but no, I’m way off. “I’m on the cruise, the Blues Cruise,” she laughs. “So many great bands… it’s fantastic, we had a fantastic jam last night, I was the host, it went until about three or four in the morning, great players, Eric Gales, Shemekia Copeland, the Phantom Blues Band, incredible people just enjoying music.”

Popovic is in good form, as well she might be. She’s cruising the Caribbean on a boat with a stack of like-minded folk; she’ll spend the next six to seven months touring her brand of fiery blues / funk / soul all around the world; and her last record, 2023’s Power, has just been nominated for two Blues Music Awards in the Blues Rock Artist of the Year and Blues Rock Album of the Year categories, along with the likes of Joe Bonamassa, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Warren Haynes and Mike Zito; it’s testament to her skill and talent that she’s keeping such good company.

“Oh yes, absolutely, there have been so many great records put out last year, and the fact it’s narrowed down to five is incredible,” she says. “We’re all winners, really, it’s a fantastic thing. I have so much respect for the others [on that list], and it’s just [brilliant] to get that recognition from the Blues Foundation in America, because I think I’m the only one there from Europe, eastern Europe, that’s for sure… which is a big thing! The American market is incredibly competitive and people are just really good, and I’m just happy to present my view on blues, my sound… the fact they recognised that is making me feel very, very good.”

Power was a very important album for Popovic. Its May 2023 release saw it arrive

some five years after 2018’s Like It On Top, her longest gap between studio records, and she’d begun work on it before she was forced to stop due to the pandemic. But it wasn’t just the forced hiatus which gives Power its power. “It was a very tough time in my life, as not only covid hit, but in the midst of that I was diagnosed with breast cancer,” she tells, “and there was a moment there where I thought maybe I should just throw in the towel. Or take some years off, give myself some time – I was looking at my life, and you don’t know what the future brings at all.”

From great adversity though, is often born great strength, and Popovic took the latter path, leaning heavily on her bassist and co-producer Buthel Burns who urged her to forge on. “When he heard the news he said, no, we’re not gonna have any breaks, we’re gonna go back to music and we’re gonna write,” she laughs. “It rephrased the whole idea for me [of putting the record on hold], so OK, let’s write and we started writing right that day.” Popovic says Power, from that moment, became a strength booster for her, adding, “It [provided] so much strength for me in the darkest time of my life with that and covid and my fourteen chemo’s I had to go through.”

As Popovic then says, “And it’s no pity party music, it’s a celebration of life, it’s a very positive record, and it’s like, if this is the last

record I’m gonna do, what am I gonna put down? What kind of message am I gonna leave?” A fair question, but one which is now, thankfully, somewhat moot as Popovic is back in good health, she’s looking forward, she’s writing new material and is putting together a different band (an eleven-piece called Fantastafunk, as a vehicle to really flesh out her music) – Power really gave her the power, and she’s grabbing it and all associated opportunity with both hands. Of Fantastafunk, an alternative to her usual six-piece band, Popovic is particularly excited. Formed after the release of Power, the band (which has already been booked for a number of festivals), has been formed to offer not just more power to Popovic’s songs, but, as she says, “more variety. We’ve got three singers, three horns, two drummers which was always my preference, bass, keyboards and myself, it’s gonna be a slightly different sound, but will give more possibility to feature the parts of the songs, really. It’s like a soul, funk, gospel extravaganza,” she laughs. “High-end show, it’s gonna give me more tools… I’m just so excited.”

Ana Popovic will play the Blues On Broadbeach festival, May 16-19. Power is available now via ArtisteXclusive Recordings.

Ash Naylor has spent the last few years in a creative frenzy, and the results are more than impressive, writes Samuel J. Fell

In order to properly understand the magnitude of what Ash Naylor has achieved recently, one must step back in order to view the whole picture; if you stand in its immediate shadow, you will not be able to take it all in.

Of course, Naylor is well known about Australian music as a cofounder of Melbourne indie-rock mainstays EVEN; he’s been a guitarist in Paul Kelly’s band for many years; he’s been a part of the RocKwiz Orkestra for almost as many as that. He’s played here, he’s played there, he’s a six-string gun for hire, and there’d barely be a soul anywhere who’d begrudge him the title of one of Australia’s finest guitarists, albeit, unfairly, one of its most underrated.

ASH NAYLOR WITH EVEN

So let’s go back a few years, in order to understand this magnitude – in 2020, Naylor released a solo instrumental album, Soundtracks Vol. 1; in 2021, he and EVEN released their eighth album (and highest charting) Reverse Light Years; two years prior to that, he’d been asked to join The Church, and so after a fallow period during the pandemic, toured hard with the band (twice through the US last year) and played a vital part on their first album in six years, 2023’s The Hypnogogue; in there as well, he contributed to Vika & Linda’s The Wait, Fanny Lumsden’s Hey Dawn, Paul Kelly’s Christmas Train and The Ronson Hangup’s new album, Centaurus, their first since their 2010 debut.

Oh, and he’s also, just last November, released another solo record, Soundtracks Vol.2. The word ‘magnitude’ barely does the man justice.

SOUNDTRACKS VOL.2 COVER SOUNDTRACKS VOL 1&2

So where to begin? Perhaps we’ll work backwards, beginning with the late 2023 release of Soundtracks Vol.2, an instrumental electric album brimming with humming guitars, jagged and smooth as the

need dictates, psych / power-pop, a meandering yet forceful display of Naylor’s guitar prowess, and indeed, a very natural progression from Soundtracks Vol.1, despite how differently both records came together.

“I’m actually sitting in the room where it all started, my loungeroom,” he smiles. “I was in the loungeroom, as a lot of us were in 2020, and I set up what seems a very antiquated system now, kinda like the audio version of a tin cup and piece of string… anyway, I was finishing up the backing tracks to what would become Reverse Light Years, and I just couldn’t stop playing.”

“I mean, first and foremost, I’m a guitar player, that sparks joy for me,” he goes on, regarding the genesis of Soundtracks Vol.1. “And sometimes I agonise over lyrics a lot, like the last two EVEN albums, I agonised a lot; sometimes I’d rewrite songs two or three times. So… it’s kinda like, why do I put myself though this torture? You know, trying to write songs, when writing instrumental pieces is like falling off a log. So, I had a backlog of instrumental tracks, and I thought, fuck it, I’ll put ‘em out online.”

And so, Soundtracks Vol.1 was born. Naylor then pressed a bunch of copies on vinyl, and they sold out – a solid endeavour. Given the circumstances, Naylor did the vast majority of the album himself, admitting all the “time I had to just focus” helped pull the record together, which is where Soundtracks Vol. 2 is quite different. “This time I had the luxury of being able to track it in a commercial studio because everything had opened up again,” he says on the follow-up. “So, I treated it [this time] as one of those classic 50+ muso vanity projects. And then I thought, everything I do should be like this, like a vanity project – it’s gotta be free and it’s gotta be expressive, it’s gotta be a true reflection of where you’re at.”

“So, I think there’s more of a performative aspect [to this record],” he muses on the evolution between the two albums. “I guess it evolved from a home recording kind of mindset, to an ‘I’m going in to make a record’ mindset. And it’s sort of segmented, four tracks on side one and four on side two – side one is sort of dense and forthright, and the second is more contemplative and not ambient, but a bit more introspective, I suppose.”

ASHLEY NAYLOR WITH THE CHURCH

THE CHURCH

“Yeah, I actually joined [the band] in 2019, but 2020 being what it was, it was actually two years before I played a show with the band,” he says ruefully on joining one of the more iconically Australian bands of our time. “The backing tracks for The Hypnogogue had been recorded in late 2019 though, we went to Damien Gerard’s studio up in Gosford, and that was the first time I’d played with the whole ensemble.

“And during 2020, whenever Steve (Kilbey) had access to a studio, he’d go down and record vocals, and by the end of this whole process, there was an album’s worth of material, and it’s been received so well. It was really exciting to be a part of that, and on top of that, you get to play the classics – it’s pretty special.” After being thrown in the deep end, in the studio with The Church, as one does, it was off on tour, 2023 being a barnburner for the band, tripping through the US twice. “Yeah, we did…[in fact], in the last couple of years I’ve done three US tours with The Church, and hearing that come out of my mouth right now seems astonishing!”

To that end, I venture to Naylor that, whether on stage or in the studio, sharing a space and making music with these people, this entity, that has such history and such a huge fanbase, it’s surely daunting – what’s it like stepping into that space? “I have those, ‘Shit, here I am!’ feelings throughout the set a lot of the time,” he laughs. “It’s an amazing feeling, not unlike the feeling playing in Paul Kelly’s band where you’re playing songs that people grew up with, and also from a fan’s perspective, I’m a fan of a lot of these songs, The Church. “And you want to honour the music. You want to play it truthfully. You want to play it as people know it… you don’t want to impose yourself upon the material, you want to play it truthfully.”

THE RONSON HANGUP, ET AL

The Ronson Hangup is a quintessentially Melbourne band, a supergroup of sorts comprising Naylor, Steve Pinkerton (Dallas Crane), Dave Mudie (Courtney Barnett), Luke Thomas and Erica Menting –according to my esteemed Rhythms colleague Jeff Jenkins, the band are “half Beatles, half Zeppelin”, and Centaurus (2023) is their first record since their 2010 debut. “I played guitar on two tracks [on the debut],” Naylor explains. “So, this [new] album was [much more of] a band record, and it did start about ten years ago, we did about half the record then. And then the second half of the record got finished up around 2021.”

The album got pieced together, slowly, like “a house of matchsticks”, but organically it’s come to be, and stands as yet another piece of work that Ash Naylor has had a hand in over the past few years. There was also Fanny Lumsden’s Hey Dawn, which won an ARIA for Best Country Album, and a Golden Guitar for Alt.Country Album of the Year. “That was fabulous,” Naylor enthuses. “We’d done a Paul Kelly tour with Fanny, and I was surprised and flattered that she asked me to play on one of the tracks.”

ASH NAYLOR WITH PAUL KELLY

And there’s also the RocKwiz Orkestra. “Yeah, we’re kind of like an extended family, it’s a wonderful situation to be in. The producers are so wonderful and flexible and patient with all of our varying schedules and workloads. So, I’ve been invited on the next round of shows, which is a blessing in so many ways, it’s hard to explain it. It’s like a family circus kind of vibe, it’s beautiful.”

Is there anything else? Have I forgotten anything? Most likely – Ash Naylor’s life, his workload, his work, has indeed been a magnitude, after all. So, I ask tentatively, given I’m exhausted merely from listening to the man’s exploits over the past few years, what’s next for Ash Naylor?

“I’ve cut myself a bit of slack,” he smiles, “like, I’m sort of freefalling in one big, long guitar solo right now.”

Soundtracks Vol.2 is available via Bandcamp

KatyKirby

Blue Raspberry

Nigel Wearne has spent the past year as a musical nomad, racking up frequent flyer points by travelling to festivals in the UK and USA.

By Nigel Wearne

They call it the Purple Palace over here. The ubiquitous purple sign that adorns every main town in the UK: Premier Inn. If I’m not doing the Airbnb thing, these are my digs of choice. Reliable comfort, budget friendly and a 12pm checkout. So, I’m sitting here in the Purple Palace with the essential travel humidifier humming on the shelf, reflecting on what’s been quite a year. A tour odyssey of sorts, that all started this time last year in the very same Purple Palace. I’m five shows into a 14-date tour of England, my third tour here in the past 12 months. I got my trusty tour buddy, wife and manager Amy Laidlaw of I Hear Django with me Tonight, I’m returning to the venue where it all began, The West End Centre in Aldershot. I started this trip with an Official Showcase at Your Roots Are Showing in Dundalk, Ireland. Two years in, this conference has a beating Irish heart that has many gems to reveal. Niall McCabe was a real standout for me; an Americana/folk songwriter with depth and gravity that commands your attention. Aussies, Monique Clare, Ernest Aines and Steve Wallis were also genuine standouts. Following Ireland, we made our way to London for UK Americana Music Week. I showcased there last year and as luck would have it, I landed a last-minute Official Showcase this year too. Turns out it pays to show up. It’s a cracking event; equal parts festival and conference. I was also invited to play ‘If We Were Vampires’ as part of their homage to Jason Isbell at the opening party. Throughout the week memorable sets came from Michele Stoddart (of The Magic Numbers), Campbell Jensen & Shaun Ferguson. The biggest highlight of the week though, was seeing Bill Kirchen wield his Tele and knock everyone dead in the best possible way. Bill and I became fast friends in Texas last year (thanks for the intro, Sarah Carroll). Anyone who saw his gig late last year in

Melbourne with Red Volkaert will be aware of his current form. Bloody epic!

Early last year, I was deemed ‘an alien of extraordinary ability’ (yes, the actual wording) and received my US 0-1 Visa. So, it began. Old Settlers Music Festival in April was my US debut. I was meant to play the first night, but there was an epic lightning storm and my set was rescheduled. All we could do was sit in the car and watch the show… for 2 hours! By the time we got back to our festival-supplied tent, it had collapsed and our bedding was drenched. Not ideal at 3am! After a phone call to Jodogga (whom we decided needed an Aussie nickname), we were sleeping on a bare mattress in a backstage caravan greenroom using our paper-thin travel towels as a doona. After about 4 hours sleep, we were unceremoniously evicted from our luxury by an overzealous staff member. Then a quick nap in the car, before my first performance in the US. Not quite the start I had in mind. So, began one of the best festivals I’ve ever been to. Thankfully the weather improved markedly, and my set went down really well with a standing ovation… a warm welcome that made up for the drowned tent. I was chuffed to be the first Australian artist to

play the festival. Although that didn’t last for long, as Tommy Emmanuel took the stage after an incredible workshop. Some of you might know I’m a luthier, so when Tommy played my guitar and loved it, I blushed. Too many highlights to mention, but the shortlist included Molly Tuttle, John R Miller, Yola, Melissa Carper and groovin’ Texan, Shiny Ribs. Wowee! What a band. Elephant Revival were amazing and included an astounding cover of Pink Floyd’s ‘Have A Cigar’. Nice to cross paths with none-other than Brian Wise to compare notes as well!

After catching James McMurtry and Southern Culture on The Skids at The Continental in Austin we flew east to Charlotte, North Carolina, and drove through the mysterious Smoky Mountains to Wilkesboro; the home of MerleFest. Here in its 35th year, I was just the fourth Aussie artist to grace their stage Started by Doc Watson in remembrance of his son and musician Merle Watson, this festival has been on my wish-list for a long time. The weather followed us, and it rained incessantly for much of the festival. But that didn’t stop the music lovers from braving the wet and cold to witness some incredible music: Joshua Ray Walker (truly amazing and his band is spectacular); Little Feat, Marcus

Backstage at MerleFest - Peter Rowan, Nigel & Jerry Douglas.

King (including a flabbergasting solo from his Dad!), Jerry Douglas, Peter Rowan, Sam Bush et al The biggest highlight though, was witnessing Brothers Of A Feather side of stage. I’ve never seen The Black Crowes live but these two are incredible as a duo.

Then, I played shows in North Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee, finishing up at Dee’s Country Cocktail Lounge in Nashville. Along the way we saw Lucinda Williams at The Orange Peel in Asheville. But more on Lucinda later… Back to the UK I played the Cambridge Folk Festival in late July, then across the Atlantic to play Mile of Music. (To say this festival is epic is an understatement 200 artists, 700 gigs in 4 days, 75,000+ punters, and it’s all free! After this was more shows through Wisconsin, Illinois, Ohio and Pennsylvania, then home).

Off again in early September, after three weeks at home. We touched down in Charlotte NC and headed north for Bristol Rhythm & Roots Reunion; The Birthplace of Country Music. This festival was 4 years in the making for me, so I was very excited after a long build up. Set in the city centre, every nook and cranny has a stage or a gig. Everything from dive bars, to listening rooms to outdoor stages. The line-up was formidable… Allison Russell, Darrell Scott, Nickel Creek, Marty Stuart & His Fabulous Superlatives, The Mavericks; all of which

were incredible. This should definitely be on your to-do list!

After catching Willie Nelson & Bobby Weir in South Carolina (I mean, honestly…?) and playing a series of shows in the south, we made our way to AMERICANAFEST in Nashville. Here, I played an Official Showcase, made my debut at The Bluebird Cafe and played The Aussie BBQ with Sounds Australia. I’d lined up a Nashville band for the occasion with drummer Lauren Horbal (Rachel Baiman) and bassist Daniel Seymour (David Olney).

“The day before my Official Showcase, Amy and I caught a brilliant in-conversation with Lucinda Williams about her book…”

The day before my Official Showcase, Amy and I caught a brilliant in-conversation with Lucinda Williams about her book ‘Don’t Tell Anybody the Secrets I Told You.’ Afterwards, we crossed paths with Lucinda in the lobby of the hotel and struck up a conversation. It ended with Lu saying she’d like to see me play, so I gave her a CD and a flyer to my show and we parted ways. I didn’t think too much of it, as meeting her was cool enough

(but quietly hoped). And lo and behold, guess who was front and centre at The 5 Spot, right on time for my show?! Mercifully, I found out afterwards. Lucinda made a point of saying how much she loved my duet ‘To The Edge’ that I sang with my buddy, Lauren Housley… an endorsement I’ll treasure. Other highlights at AMERICANAFEST were Medium Build, Elles Bailey, Jeffrey Martin and Aussies Gretta Ziller and Minor Gold.

After Nashville, I headed north for a few shows in the mid-west in Kalamazoo, Ann Arbor and Lake Orion. Then onto our final stop for the trip, San Francisco. We had to route somewhere to get home and figured it’d be wrong NOT to attend Hardly Strictly Bluegrass. A celebration of sorts for a big year of travel & hard work. Too many highlights to mention, but it has to be said: Irma Thomas.

Then it was headlong into releasing my new album The Reckoning, a project 4 years in the making with contributions from musicians in Australia, UK and Canada. After an accumulated five months overseas, innumerable shows and releasing my record, it’s been an absolute blast.

Nigel Wearne appears at the Port Fairy Folk Festival Port Fairy Folk Festival with his 6-piece band. The Reckoning is available via Bandcamp.

Nigel & Brian Wise atThe Old Settler’s Festival,Texas.

Nigel, Amy & Lucinda Williams at AMERICANAFEST.

Weathering the ups and downs of the past few years, Melbourne’s Checkerboard Lounge deliver

their brilliant new album, Roller Coaster

By Ian McFarlane

There was a time, not so long ago, when Melbourne combo Checkerboard Lounge (CBL) was the best kept secret in town.

For years you could catch them at venues such as the Union hotel, Memo Music Hall, the Great Britain hotel, George Lane and the Rainbow hotel, delivering some of the tastiest music to small yet highly appreciative audiences. They were renowned for their improvisational abilities whereby they could turn on a dime and head in a seemingly odd yet trans-dimensional phase.

Within their funky gumbo stew of blues, soul, jazz and Gospel, singer-drummer Carl Pannuzzo is the secret sauce, a singer of great conviction and passion. With simple accuracy and no pretence, the late, great Broderick Smith described him as “the best soul singer in the country”. Of course, he’s only one quarter of the recipe but we’ll get to the other guys below.

By 2019, recognition and wider acceptance came knocking on the collective door of our blues heroes. Due to their consistent and point-perfect performance they won the Melbourne Blues Appreciation Society challenge that year, which ensured a berth at the International Blues Challenge in Memphis, Tennessee (January

2020). They got to the semi-finals, a life changing and life affirming experience for Pannuzzo, guitarist Shannon Bourne, Hammond organ player Tim Neal and bassist Amos Sheehan.

While in Memphis, they were invited to record at the famous Sun Studios (B.B., Elvis, Johnny, Roy, Jerry Lee...). As an experienced live band, they were up for more challenges. In a whirlwind, five-hour live session, on the 3rd of February, they captured their award-winning, 2021 debut album, Sun Sessions. It comprised predominantly band penned tracks, plus renditions of Tampa Red’s ‘It Hurts Me Too’ and the traditional hymn ‘Amazing Grace’, topping the Australian Blues & Roots Airplay chart and being nominated as one of Rhythms’ Top 10 Albums of the Year.

As we can all appreciate, Covid-19 lockdowns and restrictions put the brakes on progress for a time. Recently jazz-trained bassist Zoë Frater replaced Sheehan and now they’ve burst forth with the release of album number two, Roller Coaster. As Carl explained when we hooked up for our interview, the title is entirely appropriate.

“It’s been a rollercoaster of a time and it’s a rollercoaster of an album, in terms of styles,” the drummer says, showing no little hint

Checkerboard Lounge by Gio Angel.

of his enthusiasm and with a spring in his step. “And honestly, we do naturally wear a few hats. Even within a trad blues we can take it anywhere from jazz to psychedelia. It just happens as a live band and so sometimes the song writing also just comes out that way. We had no major designs for the album, it was just ‘follow our noses’ and try to be true to ourselves. That both means in the song writing and the arrangements, most of which happened in the studio.

“The title track, for example, started as an easy backwards shuffle, pretty cruisey. Shannon just said ‘why don’t we count it in like this’... he counted it in and suddenly we’re all going bang, and it was on! That’s the version on the album and that’s what we play now. Most of it happened in the studio, on the day. We know that if we try to cultivate or pre-fabricate too much, we lose the essence of the electricity in the band. We’ve been such a live band for so many years we know how to respond on the high wire, and if we make too safe a foundation it might be okay, but will it be that exciting? Probably not, so we’d rather risk the idea that we might fall over and end up with something that is amazing, than just play safe for the sake of being in a studio.”

SOUNDS OF THE CITY

CBL worked with fellow Melbourne blues legend Jeff Lang, who has managed to record a vibrant and deep sound while also focusing on each musician’s role within the ensemble delivery.

“Jeff was fantastic to work with. He’s a smart guy and knows how to get a fantastic guitar sound; and he got beautiful vocal sounds too. He’s got a great manner about him, he’s very funny and helped us relax in the studio. Not being too precious is the antidote to the natural stress of ‘getting it right’. Because music itself can be so ephemeral and transitory it’s counter-intuitive and unnatural to shoehorn it into a box that people are going to listen to forever.

“When we play live, we’re still not fixed on playing one way. We’ll do a particular song and each time it might be different from what’s on the album. It’s still indicative of us, it’s just that the information that comes out will probably be different from what you heard last time. If we don’t have that electricity, it’s still serviceable but my belief is that the more reality we can give people, in terms of that electricity, it amplifies that repeated listening experience for the audience.”

One of the great things about listening to the album is that I’m struck by the maturity and self-assurance of Pannuzzo’s soulful vocals. I venture to say to him that I’m hearing echoes of what the great Ian Moss did with his vocal turns in Cold Chisel. Is that overstepping the mark?

“Oh, no. I’ll take that as a compliment! I love Ian Moss’s vocals. He’s got a beautiful sound and intention behind what he sings. He’s not so much of a throw-it-away kind of a singer as I am. One thing I’ve learned from Shannon and Tim... even Zoë who’s an amazing soloist; she does four bass solos on the record. I don’t think there’s any other blues album with four bass solos on it. So, with Shannon and Tim, we always want to keep that spontaneity alive and, in the moment, cultivating a sense of statement. Shannon’s a naturally great exponent of that.

“Shannon’s got such an incredible voice and stream of consciousness. You just think there are no edges to the guy, and yet he’s so well

Indeed, Bourne is such an unsung talent. His exacting guitar technique and poise, as well as the ability to take you completely by surprise has struck me when I’ve seen him playing, whether with CBL, solo or as sideman to the late, great Chris Wilson. I recall that I watched him play a John Martyn song one time (... I wish I could remember the title) and it virtually knocked my socks off. I could barely contain myself, once he’d finished his solo set, to let him know it had been a fabulous listening experience.

At this point in our chat, I ask Carl to talk about the genesis and early part of the CBL story. He explains that he started playing with his high school mates when they were about 14–15-year-olds. He mentions Dan Kerr (guitar), Tony Mondello (bass; “he was from the Badlands, down south, the coolest guy we’d ever seen” is Pannuzzo’s pithy description now) and Leon Ragg (piano). Eventually Pannuzzo, Mondello and Kerr decided “let’s be a blues band”, so they advertised for a harmonica player and Ian Collard applied and was accepted with open arms into the fledgling band.

By the late 1980s, guitarist Dave ‘Max’ Meredith and bassist Tom Wandaller came on board and along with Pannuzzo and Collard, under the name Checkerboard Lounge, they began their live adventures on the Melbourne pub circuit. Many a blues fan might know that the Checkerboard Lounge was the name of blues guitar legend Buddy Guy’s Chicago club, which he ran from 1972 into the 1980s. I ask Carl if he felt they might have been channelling Buddy Guy when they started?

“Not particularly,” he explains. “We did love the wildness of the Chicago electric blues vibe. It appealed to our teenage sensibilities. Mostly we were looking for a good band name. We were looking at blues album covers, searching for a clue, and this one called Drinkin’ TNT ‘n’ Smokin’ Dynamite showed a picture of the Checkerboard Lounge, which had been the first black and white allowed venue, that was very political at the time. We’ve always been into the weird incongruity of being white and privileged guys playing the blues. You love, and are very passionate about, this music that resonates but you can’t ignore that oddness.

“I started playing this music as a teenager, before I’d even had a relationship, so I didn’t even know what half the songs were about. The idea was, well, it’s just a good name, it feels good, the ideology behind it is good, so let’s just go with that.”

Collard took his leave in the mid-1990s, going on to form Collard Greens & Gravy. Sadly, Meredith passed away and Tim Neal added his Hammond organ skills throughout the late 1990s. Eventually the lineup of Pannuzzo, Neal, Bourne and Sheehan solidified.

“It was very sad when Max died. He was the guy who taught me that I could learn from my mistakes. I used to think that I was a pretty shitty drummer, but he always encouraged me to get better. He really did give me a whole new perspective. He was a beautiful guitarist, kind of like a cross between Mark Knopfler and Albert Collins. Yeah, quite a strange character but he helped us define that improvisational method. Being able to listen to your mistakes and going with them, getting into that creativity was the way to go forward. That became the greater evolution of the band.

“With Max in the band we’d had a long residency every Sunday at the Great Britain. Sometimes it’d be for up to seven hours long, just ridiculous but so much fun. Then once Shannon stepped in after Max, it started to feel like, ‘okay, we might be able to get serious here’. He’s such an incredible player. I mean, Max and Dan were amazing, beautiful players but there was something about Shannon... he could do it all, that improvising and engaging in the spontaneity but making it count every time. You’d see a ‘I wonder what they’re going to do this time’ kind of band. We started writing more original songs and we were able to get beyond that idea of being a bit of a lost underground live band.”

Now with Zoë Frater on board, their little explored yet inherently-inwaiting jazz and funk tendencies have been ripe for exploration.

“We’d had a situation a few years ago when Amos had missed the start of a gig. And I’d lost my voice, so I’d asked a trumpet player-singer fella called Adrian to fill in. He’s married to Zoë, and she’d just come from her teaching job and just happened to have her bass in the car. I asked her to fill in until Amos arrived. She said ‘yes, fine’. She’s a jazz composer with her own band – I call it friendly Zappa – and she’s amazing. She did the whole first set; it was incredible. No rehearsal, no instruction, no songs worked out... I had no idea of her understanding of blues and soul. Amos had arrived mid-set and he’d just stood back and took it all in. A few years later when he decided to take his leave, we just asked Zoë and it was a perfect transition.”

I get back to asking the singer about their Memphis IBC experience... “That was fantastic! We didn’t feel like it was a competition in many ways though. It’s a large festival, a bunch of people from all around the world playing in this amazing, historic place. Unfortunately, the blues is more of a museum now, sort of maintained by white people. We did get to the semi-finals which was great. After us, one of Muddy Waters’ nephews and his band came out. They were tight, had these bright red suits on, they were ticking all the criteria to get to the finals, but they didn’t get a guernsey. I thought that was a bit weird. This Canadian trio, sort of middle of the road, not that exciting to me, they were the winners of this international blues competition. It was very strange.”

(Still, as Melbourne Blues Appreciation president John Durr has explained to me, it’s the consistency of the performance on the day, and the ability not to lose points as much as scoring the points that hands over the accolade of winning act.)

Carl continues... “We had a great time, we played some great music, we met lovely people. We went to Al Green’s church and saw the great man. It was fantastic, just a suburban church but the real deal. The musicians there were the best we’d seen all week. They weren’t even trying to show off, just there for the right reasons.”

With regards to the new album, there are many surprises in store. ‘Uncivil Compliance’ has been issued as a 7-inch 45, backed with the title track. ‘Came to Get My Heart Back’ boasts the suffix “mix with slight return”.

“Oh, yeah. That was a fun idea that we just ran with in the studio. We didn’t really have a sense of how we could end the song, we just vamped out on the song and Shannon played an incredible solo. We thought, ‘oh, we’ll fade it out’. Jeff came up with the idea of adding to the fade out with a slight return fade back in. It was a fun way of ending the first side of the LP. Then for the CD and download we have it as a ghost track.”

Indeed, you get the double whammy of ‘Prodigal Man’ – a superb, jazzy, seven-minute masterclass in song writing which turns out to be the key track here – and after a gap of 30 seconds, the whole 11 minutes of ‘Came to Get My Heart Back’ unfolds, complete with a phenomenal, six-minute Shannon Bourne solo that is a sheer joy to hear.

“It’s hard to be objective about this record,” Pannuzzo muses. “‘Double Standard’ has become one of my favourites now, even though I didn’t think it hit the mark in the studio at the time. I love the feel of it now, people have really responded to it. ‘King of Nothing’ is very different. It’s very jazzy and no one would believe it’s the same guitarist playing that solo in a rock blues event. We got that one right. But as a band experience, I love ‘Prodigal Man’. It’s jazzy too, almost Pink Floyd like with Tim’s sax solo. It’s got some dramatic percussive effects behind it. “We workshopped that one together, I wanted more than just Shannon’s riff and my words. I wanted everyone’s involvement. It was a nice experience of creating together and cultivating something that I think is an interesting way of looking at the idea of how to throw down the patriarchy in a way that’s going to work, rather than annoy or confront people. That sense of saying the change starts with the self, and one has to be prepared to recognise they were already further from their truth than they might have already admitted. By returning to oneself with a bit more honour and bravery, to effect that change.”

Once I get over the challenge of getting to grips with our existential crisis in the face of a benign universe, Pannuzzo finishes by telling me that as part of the process of promoting Roller Coaster, CBL has several festival slots (including Broadbeach and Gumball) and a New Zealand tour lined-up for later in the year. In the first instance, as you read this, they will have already launched the album at Melbourne’s Brunswick Ballroom in February. In the meantime, Roller Coaster is available and it’s a splendid ride.

Roller Coaster is available on vinyl, CD and download from Cheersquad Records

BInterviewing musician and artist Darren Gallagher (a.k.a Gallie) opens the door to a kaleidoscopic world of colourful characters and adventures, filled to the brim with tales both tall and true. He is a master story teller on-stage and off, and it’s easy

to see how

this skill translates into his song writing and on-stage presence. By Jen

ursting to the seams with a restless creative energy, Gallie is also a consummate visual artist. The artwork he has completed for his two audio releases (Occoquan River and soon-to-be-officially released Dublin Rain) provide a stunning testament to this fact. But over all the years that I’ve been friends with Gallie, I realise there is much I don’t know about him – his early years in Dublin, how he ended up settling in Australia, and most puzzling of all – why isn’t this guy better known in the music world?

With these questions in mind I decided to travel to his current hometown of Kingscliff on the NSW north coast to record an interview with him in late October last year. First of all I must provide a bit of background around how we first met. We were both performing with separate acts at a Bob Dylan tribute show – the annual ‘Forever Young’ concerts that have contributed to the Melbourne folk music scene since 2015.

My memory requires prodding on some finer points of this history, so Gallie reminds me that it was around 2016, and I played fiddle on a version of ‘Black Diamond Bay’ with Mick Thomas (formerly of Weddings Parties Anything) which rather impressed him. The next year he invited me to step in on ‘Hurricane’ with him, and the following year we tackled another song – ‘Isis’ - featuring Gallie on acoustic guitar and vocals, with Chris Wilson (harmonica) and myself trading solos. Out of that initial Dylan connection Gallie invited me to perform with his own original band. These days, on the rare occasions that he plays a show with a full band line-up I’m always keen to join in. His songs and musicianship are a joy to be a part of, not to mention playing with the other performers he surrounds himself with, including his current line-up of Danny McKenna (drums), Tristan Courtney (upright bass), Daniel Browne (keyboards) and Shane Riley (electric guitar, mandolin, pedal steel).

Gallie begins our interview by recalling his formative years in Dublin. He paints a picture of strong family ties and community spirit, where drinking, music, poetry and laughter are contrasted against a city backdrop of unemployment and violence. Born in the 1970’s, he grew up in a large family with a religiously fanatical father, which meant he was sent off to mass every Sunday.

“Everybody was religious in Ireland. There used to be 5.30 mass Sunday mornings, 7.30, 8.30, 9.30, 10.30, 12.30, 5.30 again and 7.30, and you couldn’t fit into any of those services - there’d be a semicircle out the front door. Me and my mates would go to the 12.30 ‘bonk’, as we called it. One of our gang would go in and get the sermon leaflet and we’d all have to study what was on it, because we’d be quizzed when we got back home – and we all took it in turns to go and listen to the sermon. The rest of us would just be hanging out in the laneway mucking around.

Anderson

“My dad was an absolute fitness fanatic. He used to sit with weights on his legs whilst watching TV. But he was also a street fighter I remember my uncle telling me how men would come from all over the city to fight him. Nobody could beat him. There were a lot of better fighters, but they couldn’t get past him, cos he was so fit. And my grandad was part of the Animal Gangs of the 1930’s and 40’s – he was notorious. Him and his mate ‘Duck Egg Murphy’ one year robbed the local butchers on Christmas Eve so they could feed everybody from the tenement slums on Christmas Day. So, my family all come from inner city Dublin – rough as, Dickensian poverty, and they were smack bang in the middle of all that.”

By this stage of our interview, I’m being swept away by all these stories and more – too many to repeat here; and I need to remind myself (and Gallie!) that I’m here to focus on his career, even though I could happily listen to his tales all evening.

So, was there music in your family other than through the church?

“My granddad on my mum’s side and his seven brothers played in a Dixieland jazz outfit in the 30’s and 40’s, and they used to travel all around Ireland. And my granny played piano and saxophone. But neither of my parents ever learned any instruments.”

Gallie goes on to say how he was a bit of a loner growing up. He loved drawing, and from the age of 12, he’d head out onto the streets of Dublin to make money by covering the pavements with his chalked works; emulating the Jim Fitzpatrick album covers of his heroes Thin Lizzy and the like. He saved up and bought his first guitar – a Gibson Marauder – with the money he earned, even though he had no idea how to play it. But he was listening and learning about music in whatever ways he could.

“My dad had an awesome record player with amazing speakers. We used to go and rob our records from 2nd hand record stores cos we couldn’t afford to buy them. We’d go through the records in the racks and put the ones we liked up the front and then one of the lads would cause a distraction and then we’d just grab them and run – every week we’d end up with 10 or 20 albums. We probably ended up with a better record collection than the rich kids cos we were nicking them! I’ll never forget hearing Jimi Hendrix on vinyl from (playing) live at the Fillmore (Band of Gypsies). Reading the liner notes – that’s what was magic back then. You’d be on top of the bus reading the notes then go home and stick the record on.”

So, Gallie taught himself how to play guitar, and formed a band. He goes on to say; “We were playing down the shed in the back yard for years. I got into writing. None of the lads would sing so I’d sing. My dad took over this pub in Dublin where his dad used to drink. >>>

>>> It was one of the roughest pubs in Dublin. People walking along the street going for their evening stroll used to cross the road. Dad was always coming down to the shed and asking ‘When are you coming in to do a gig?’ We didn’t want to play in that place cos it was a lunatic asylum – eventually he said he’d give us 10 pounds each to play on a Thursday night. We were shit scared cos of all the gangsters who used to hang out there. But we were actually really good and we set up in a tiny corner and did a rendition of ‘All Along the Watchtower’, and the guitarist ripped, and it all went down so well that you couldn’t move in the pub for the next 6 months – we were 18,19 at the time.” He tells me how he had a yearning to leave Dublin, and escape the entrenched poverty of the place.

“There was absolutely no work. When we left school the careers officer showed us how to sign on to the dole and gave us a phone number of a guy in London where you could get a labour job – that was your career life options. We’d go busking and Glenn Hansard would be a block up the road raking in the money, while we were busking away in the rain with an empty packet of crisps and a pigeon standing in front of us. I could see myself living in a bedsit when I was 40, I could see all those musicians who were doing just that.”

Gallie wanted something better, and his opportunity came when one day out of the blue he received a phone call from a promoter in the Canary Islands, offering 300 euros a week, with free accommodation and food, in return for playing covers at a tourist resort. So, he and his band took off on that adventure, and never looked back. From there, they started providing entertainment at ski resorts in Austria, France and Canada, and in between seasons he was surfing – “I mean next thing I’m surfing those big waves in Guatemala and south of Mexico – it was philosophically and geographically so far away from where I grew up. The music just took a back step for a while there. I was more into catching waves and the music was just a way to travel.”

But I know that music and writing is in Gallie’s veins, and although he’s a bit dismissive of his career during those many years of travelling the

world I learn that he was in fact writing songs and performing a lot, from busking on the streets of Paris to headlining the folk stage at the Mississippi Delta Blues Festival in Caxais Do Sul in Southern Brazil, accompanied by a 46 piece orchestra.

He met Australian girl Kellie in 1999 and they kept travelling for quite a while. She eventually became the mother of his two children. They are still together, and he makes reference to her often during our conversation, commenting on what a wonderful partner and mother she is, and embracing the remarkable support she provides him as an artist and musician. At last I now know why he ended up in Australia! All that remains is to solve the puzzle of why he has released so little in the way of original music, and why he is still relatively unknown. I press on with my questions.

You’ve written a lot of songs, recorded a lot of music, but barely released anything… why is that?

“Because I won’t release them if they’re not good enough. Simple as that.”

So, what helped Occoquan River get over the line for release in late 2015?

“Before Occoquan River I’d made an EP and a full album - never released either of them. I spent 30,000 euros on that early album, recorded it in Dublin. And there was maybe a couple of songs that showed potential and I could have squeezed them into some kind of shape, but they were just not good enough.

“Occoquan River was made here in Australia. I had fifteen thousand (dollars) to spend from crowd funding. But it took two years and every penny I had left to make that record. Another twenty-seven grand. It got to the stage where it was ready to go, and about to go to print, but I pulled it. It just wasn’t good enough. And everybody was going ‘but you can’t do it again, you’ve already spent so much money on it’. But I was right – 100% right. We went back in, re-recorded ‘Long May Your Days Be Gold’, different key, mellowed it out, bit of Spanish

Gallie with Tristan Courtney and Jen Anderson - photo by Mark Hopper

guitar... It had been sounding like an Aussie rock song, or U2. Nothing wrong with that - it might have given me a massive hit! But I didn’t like it that way. I wanted something that was a bit more ‘genteel’ folk. I ended up scrapping six songs, had to go away and work my arse off, got the money up to re-record… and then…we were about to release it again… and I scrapped three songs. So, I spent another six months working my arse off, playing in pubs, selling my soul, and went back in and re-recorded those songs.”

There’s a pattern emerging here. Is it madness, or is it someone who will stop at nothing to obtain the perfection he can hear in his head? The story goes on… “The night before it was due for pressing, I went … ‘Kel’… and she went ‘No! you’re not!’ and I went ‘it’s just one song. ‘A Beautiful Lie’. The groove is still too Aussie rock – it’s not swingin’ enough – it’s not ‘black’ enough.’ And she went ‘You can’t! You’re not!’… and then I realised I was just going to have to let it go. So, I let it go. But I shouldn’t have! It doesn’t swing enough!” he finishes with a laugh.

Well, all that pain and money was surely worth it. Occoquan River is, in my opinion, a masterful showcase of Gallie’s song writing and musicianship. But with no record label, no agent and no manager, it has remained quietly hidden amongst the thousands of other independent Australian releases.

Following on from Occoquan River, Gallie has been through a similar journey recording and re-recording another batch of brilliant songs over the course of the past five years or so. Not satisfied until recently, the songs finally reached the bar of his exacting standards, and he is now happy enough to release them to the world. I’ve been involved in many of the earlier recordings for Dublin Rain. Sometimes, I’ve been perplexed as to why he wasn’t happy enough with them, but now, having heard the final mastered recording of his new album I understand why.

He makes a salient point about his laborious recording process. His newer songs don’t have the luxury of ‘road testing’ as is the case with so many other artists. He says “I mean it’s not like you have the chance to go on tour and work the songs out to get them ready for recording. They’re still fresh and haven’t been worked in – no chance to think about them and say ‘that lyric is a bit weak there’ or ‘that bridge should be changed around there’.. and also I don’t have a working

band. You guys (meaning myself and the others in his current band) are in every sense session players, and you probably wouldn’t have felt that you had the right to comment on the vocal delivery, or if you didn’t think a chorus was strong enough.”

These words ring true in my mind, but those newer songs had certainly evolved and matured by the time Gallie hooked up with recording engineer and producer Erick Jaskowiak in early 2023. Now Erick is no slouch when it comes to his pedigree. As a seven-time Grammy nominated recording engineer, and winner of several other awards in Norway and Australia, he knows what he’s doing. Having spent much of his career based in Nashville Tennessee, he has in more recent years spent time on and off in Victoria. Erick suggested that Gallie come to Nashville, where he would pull in some top-notch session players. “At first, I had no interest in going to Nashville, but he kept on at it, saying that he’d be able to get some good session players for the record. But then I had to go to Kansas for the Folk Alliance Conference, and I started thinking more seriously about it. He reckoned we could knock out an album in two days. I’d just spent four years of my life trying to get this next record how I wanted it and he was talking two days? But in the end, I decided to give it a go.”

Erick booked Sound Emporium Studios in Nashville, and did indeed pull some great session players in; players such as Bryan Owings on drums (Buddy Miller, Emmylou Harris), Dennis Crouch on bass (Dolly Parton, Steve Earle, Johnny Cash, Robert Plant), Ryan Connors on piano, B3 and vibes (Yola, Hozier), Russ Pahl on pedal steel and guitars (Sierra Ferrell, Angel Olsen), Fats Kaplin on fiddle, mandolin and oud (Kieran Kane, Kevin Welch) and Steven Sheehan on acoustic guitar (Jim Lauderdale, the Judds, Randy Travis). Angie Primm (Patti Austin, Rascal Flatts) and Gayle Mayes (Mavis Staples, Solomon Burke) provided some very classy backing vocals.

Gallie says “When I realised where I was and who I’d be playing with I was pooing my pants. I was so nervous I didn’t want to play guitar with the rest of the band, even though I’d written a really intricate riff for the first song that Erick wanted to do. My voice was quavering, I kept losing my finger picking (on guitar). I didn’t want to slow anybody down, so I asked Steve, one of the session players, to do it. But after 20 mins or so and him not being able to nail that riff I realised ‘these

Gallie PFFF 23 with Tristan Courtney, Jen Anderson and Danny McKenna

>>> people are human’ and it relaxed me and the whole room relaxed and things started working. By the second day the room was cooking and it all started coming together.”

So, I guess you knew then that this was going to work, or did you still need to go away and listen to the mixes?

“I hate listening to rough mixes – the last thing I want to do if we’ve been recording all day is go home and listen to mixes. So, when Erick offered to bounce down some rough mixes of the day’s recording I said ‘nah don’t bother, cos I can’t hear it’. With rough mixes, I start analysing it and thinking things like ‘is the hi hat too loud’, and then I end up just pissing everyone off, especially producers! With this recording I didn’t know how I’d feel about it when I listened to it, which wasn’t for weeks. But the difference with Erick was it was 100% trust, we had some great conversations. In the past with other producers we’ve had similar conversations but when we got into the studio they’d head off in a different direction. Erick was true to our conversations.” Gallie goes on to say “At last I have a record that I’m really proud of, even though I find it hard to be objective, but I do know that the engineering and production and musicianship are incredible.”

Phew! It sounds like this recording is going ahead with a release. So, I ask, ‘In a practical sense, how are you going to release this album? What formats, what’s your plans, what’s your hope for your future and your art?

“Well in the past few months I’ve just been focused on the Irish show (Sionnach Rua’s Great Irish Song Book) - that’s just going back to my roots. It’s a totally different thing to my original music. I mean, it’s a business plan to try and help the profile. I wanted to get in front of a different audience. I’ve been really struggling to get any sort of traction. I’ve had a small and loyal following for my original stuff for ages but…we’ve played to well over 10,000 people in the past year with the Irish band (Paddy Montgomery – bazouki, mandolin, guitar, Sam Davies – Uilleann Pipes and Ruth Wise – fiddle). I do a couple of my original songs and I sell as many original CDs as the ones for the Irish show on the night.

“I’ve been struggling to get festival gigs, struggling to get industry interest musically, and maybe it’s because I’ve got a couple of kids, and I’m not out and about and not doing the networking. Justin Bieber on his last record had fifteen hundred publicists, and I can’t even afford one! I can’t find an agent. I’ve been working about ten hours a day at

least doing the logistics for this Irish show. I’m the lead singer, the tour manager, the promoter, booking all the flights, the hotels. But I love the music business. I don’t expect handouts from anybody. You make your own luck. I just love playing, and if I’ve got a bed for the night and a few beers, I’m happy.”

Gallie’s new record is sensational. And I couldn’t agree more that the production, engineering and musicianship are incredible. His songs and vocal delivery are absolutely world class. But don’t take my word for it – grab yourself a ‘pre-release’ copy and I guarantee you will not be disappointed. And maybe, just maybe, he will finally achieve the success he deserves.

Dublin Rain ‘pre-release version’ is available on CD via bandcamphttps://gallie.bandcamp.com/merch

Or contact directly on gallie1610@hotmail.com

Website: https://www.gallie.com.au/

The official release dates of the album and tour are planned for the second half of 2024.

Inside Cover Occoquan River - Artwork by Gallie

Dublin Rain. Pre -release Cover Artwork by Gallie

Madison Cunningham is a Grammy winner (and multiple nominee) and an ambassador for Fender and the Vintera II.

By Brian Wise

When we catch up to chat by Zoom it is literally between tours for Madison Cunningham – just one spare day in her schedule. It is late in the year, and she is dashing between Canada and her home in the US before heading off to Europe. Right now she will be in Europe on the bill with John Mayer, playing venues as big as the O2 Arena in London. Then it is straight back to the States for yet another national tour.

At 27 years of age, Cunningham has already won a Grammy – Best Folk Album for her third album Revealer in 2023 - and has been nominated four other times. Nine years ago, she began her recording career in her home state of California with an album influenced by her time in the church, where she had been playing guitar since the age of seven. Five years later, after graduating from high school - and having a musical epiphany via artists such as Joni Mitchell, Dylan, Jeff Buckley, the Beatles and others - she released her first Grammy nominated album Who Are You Now? That, along with the latest album, has taken her career to another level. So, we are lucky to catch her.

Despite her hectic schedule, Cunningham is sitting, relaxed on some steps in a Quebec public park on a sunny afternoon, happy to chat. (A week later she’ll be a headliner at Madison Square Garden in New York!). She is an engaging conversationalist…….especially, when you get her onto her favourite subject, guitars.

Cunningham is an ambassador for the Fender Vintera II guitar. It’s not a stretch for her; she already plays a Fender Jazzmaster and her playing echoes some classic influences. Madison has also recorded a haunting version of The Flamingo’s ‘50s hit ‘I Only have Eyes For You’ with Prince guitarist, the legendary Wendy Melvoin as a promotion for the Vintera. (You can see it on YouTube).

“Very luckily, I was asked to be involved in it,” explains Cunningham, “and I jumped at the chance to do it because Fender’s obviously such a staple in my world as a guitar player and the world of almost everybody I know as a musician as well.

“Also, I think this being the sort of ‘50s iteration of these models was really important because that was really the birthplace of the electric guitar and the Jazzmaster itself. That is a guitar that’s just meant a lot to me and informed my playing and has been a very trusty road companion for the last six or seven years of my life. So, it was just quite the honour to be able to lend my voice to it in some way, and then to pick out a song from the Fifties that meant a lot to me.”

“In particular, I was really getting into low tunings and open tunings,” continues Cunningham, “and a Stratocaster is historically very bright and articulate in that way. I ended up kind of gravitating towards the

Jazzmaster for very materialistic reasons. I really loved the look and the shape. I loved the price and what I realised about it as I started to play it and before purchasing it was just the depth that it could hold and the intonation. I felt like it was a very sort of open canvas for ideas, and I felt really at home on the fretboard. So, I’ve stuck with it and feel quite married to it in a way. Every time I’ve kind of been in a certain situation, it’s loaned itself to whatever situation that is musically or whatever it is. So, I’ve stayed true to it for those reasons.

So, how does the ’50s Vintera II version of the Jazzmaster differ from the one she has been using?

“It’s a lot heavier than the one that I play now. I kind of noted that about it,” replies Cunningham. “The body itself is thicker and more dense but the sound is slightly different. It feels a little bit brighter in some ways. The fretboard was in some ways easier to play than mine. There were lighter strings on it than the strings I usually play. The differences weren’t immense but they were slight. I really enjoyed the challenge it posed, or at least the slight difference that jarred me enough and it caused me to play a little bit differently and I always liked that feeling.”

“I’m always on the quest for finding ways to make guitar playing sound more like myself, feel more like myself,” says Cunningham when I ask her if she is a bit of a guitar nerd like so many other players. “I think that’s just a constant question always. As a person and a player, I’m always changing. So, I think nerding out is kind of just par for the course.”

“Still the greatest guitar player to me is George Harrison and his melodic capabilities and the way that he prioritises melody over anything else, over showmanship,” she immediately replies when I ask about some of her favourite players.

“I think Jon Brion is another huge one for me. An artist named Juana Molina changed the landscape for me. Joni Mitchell too. She was a guitar player that really taught me a lot about rhythm and voicings and open tunings, all of it. Rarely do I ever play in standard. Most of the songs are in open tunings, and it’s where I like to live.”

“He was another just life-changing artist for me,” says Cunningham when I mention Jeff Buckley. “He’s in my top five. He is the person that I would say that I shamelessly rip off all the time because I think that we all need that sort of wellspring to draw from. He’s just one of the main ones and such a musical force and died so young but accessed that sort of those deep waters really young. It’s unbelievable. As a singer, he really blew me away but then as a guitar player, I think he remained pretty uncredited for that. He would pull out these voicings that I had never heard anyone else do up until him, so much so that the phrase Buckley Voicings were coined because of him, and he blows me away.”

Madison Cunningham and Wendy Melvoin.

By Joe Fulco

THE FENDER TONE MASTER PRO

Use the Fender Tone Master Pro on a stage, at a weekend club, in the basement and even or just in your rehearsal room and enjoy its versatility in sounds, functionality and connectivity.

WHAT IS IT?

The Fender Tone Master Pro is an amp modeller and effects unit. It exists to give the option of either taking the place of, or living alongside, your existing guitar amplifier. And while your amp is one single unit, the Tone Master Pro sells itself as many amps, guitar pedals, speaker cabinets and options to potentially not have you needing to look elsewhere to get sounds.

WHAT DOES IT DO?

Choose an amp from a list, put an effects pedal in front of the amp or within the effects loop, choose the speaker cab of choice, choose your desired microphone placement etc. There are enough variables to dial in a sound. I managed to get this happening without looking through the manual, so it was user friendly. The unit has a screen that lays out the configuration of choice. Adjust the pedals or the amp by tapping the screen and turning the dials as you would on the real deal. It’s pretty intuitive.

TEST DRIVE

The issue that I am always confronted with when trying guitar modellers is this: does it feel like an amp? Will the guitar react, respond and have the warmth that you get when plugged into an actual tube amp. It’s asking a lot. I found that when plugged into an interface through a DAW (digital audio workstation) with the sound coming through the monitors, it felt and sounded as good as any designed guitar plugin I ‘ve tried. And in a recording environment, the options of sounds at hand make it a very useful tool. From classic Fender amp sounds to British style amps that sound and react like they are at high volume when you turn the dial up on the virtual amp, you get into the big pluses of having a unit like this sitting in your studio. Sound like your amp’s cranked and still get along with your neighbours. You can plug your headphones into the unit and practice away all night. Or you can plug it into your actual amp and bypass the amp modelling stage and make use of the effects pedals and the different configurations that you can set up.

CONNECTIONS

The Tone Master Pro has the connectivity options to use it pretty much however your imagination inspires you to. I even plugged straight through an old Fender Twin set up clean, kept the Fender Tone Master Pro’s amp simulator switched on along with a few effects pedals and saturated the walls of the room I was in. Besides messing about with all the ways that you probably won’t end up using this device, it will definitely be a useful option in the studio when you are in creative mode.

THE VERDICT

The unit offers so much that it is hard to narrow it down here. Best thing to do is try one out and see how it sounds and feels under your hands. Fender will undoubtably iron out any bugs and offer new effects with software updates well into the future. They come in at around $2500. Not cheap, but when you start weighing up spending a similar amount on a singular amp, it’s the options of the Tone Master Pro that may pull you in its direction and the price makes sense. Separately, Fender do offer a speaker cab to match this unit. The Fender Tone Master FR-10 1x10” Full Range Flat Response Powered Speaker, adding another option in the ways you can use this unit.

FEATURES :

• Over 100 Tone Master quality Amp & Effect Models

• Over 6000 Fender-captured Impulse Responses with a variety of cabinet and microphone options

• 3rd Party IR support

• 7” Colour Touch-screen

• Innovative Song & Setlist modes

• 60 second Stereo Looper

• 4 Effects Loops for integrating your favourite pedals

• Instrument and XLR mic inputs

• 10 proprietary footswitch/encoders with LCD “scribble strips”

• True pre-set spill over of delay and reverb tails for seamless present changes

• Firmware updates over USB

• Compatible with Tone Master Pro Control desktop app for editing, sharing and downloading pre-sets

• Over 500 User Pre-sets with access to thousands more from the Cloud using the Tone Master Pro Control App

• Bluetooth wireless connection for streaming audio from a mobile device

• Stereo 1/4” Headphone output jack for silent practice

Revive the timeless sound of the ‘50s with the Vintera® II ‘50s Nocaster® and experience the iconic looks, inspiring feel and incomparable tone that only a Fender can deliver. The Vintera® II ‘50s Nocaster® features an alder body and a maple neck for classic Telecaster® tone that’s full of punch and clarity. The Early-’50s thick “U”-shape neck has thick shoulders for an authentic feel and tone, while the 7.25” radius fingerboard with vintage-tall frets provide vintage comfort with ample room for big bends and expressive vibrato. Under the hood, you’ll find a pair of vintage-style ‘50s pickups that deliver all the crystal-clear chime and raw, steely twang that made Fender famous. The vintage-style 3-saddle bridge with barrel brass saddles offers authentic ‘50s twang, while vintage-style tuning machines provide classic looks with a finer gear ratio and enhanced tuning stability to complete the package.

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By Denise Hylands

Here’s to 2024…and all the new music it will bring. March and April is certainly a busy time for new releases and this year does not disappoint. So here goes…

Let’s start with Charley Crockett, who has just toured Australia, far and wide. If you didn’t see him, you missed a real deal country artist. Crockett and his band, The Blue Drifters give 100% to their live shows. Crockett is usually quite prolific with his music and releases, although we only received the wonderful Live At The Ryman album and The Man From Waco (Redux) EP last year. He started the year well with a Willie Nelson duet, ‘That’s What Makes The World Go Round’ and has followed up with his latest album $10 Dollar Cowboy. An album written from the back of his tour bus. Songs that are raw, personal, vivid portraits of a country in transition.

Written at truck stops, casinos, alleys behind venues and in his truck.

Charley says, “a ramblin’ man like me, a genuine transient, is in a pretty damn good position to have something to say about America”.

Like Crockett, Sierra Ferrell started the year with an appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live!. It’s so good to see these artists being given this kind of exposure. Ferrell has just released the highly anticipated follow up to her breakthrough album Long Time Coming. This one’s called Trail of Flowers and like you would expect is overflowing with Ferrell’s spectacular and unique sound.

Blending old time musical styles with bold new ideas to showcase her new batch of songs about her struggle to build a life in a culture consumed by capitalism. Many people may not be familiar with the name Alice Randall but most likely you may have heard a song she’s written. For more than four decades the songwriter, New York Times best-selling author (The Wind Done Gone), and acclaimed educator Alice Randall has been one of the few Black female writers on Nashville’s Music Row, and the first to pen a #1 hit (Trisha Yearwood’s ‘XXXs and OOOs’). While she has seen her songs recorded by multiple generations of country artists - from Glen Campbell and Mo Bandy, to Marie Osmond and Yearwood - none of those artists looked like her. Until now. Oh Boy Records are set to release (April 12) My Black Country, a collection of Randall’s most beloved songs as interpreted by some of the strongest Black female voices in modern country, roots and folk music including Rhiannon Giddens, Saaneah Jamison, Valerie June, Miko Marks, Leyla McCalla, Rissi Palmer, Allison Russell, Sistastrings, Adia Victoria, Sunny War, and Alice’s daughter Caroline Randall Williams.

Canadian cowboy, and I can say that for real, Corb Lund has recently released his latest album El Viejo, which means ‘the old one’. Dedicated to his late good friend Ian Tyson. Lund says, “I’ve been wanting to make a record like this for a long time. The band and I produced it ourselves in my living room with no adults present. It’s all acoustic, not an electric lick on the album…banjos and mandos and string basses and stripped-down drums.”

And from a real Australian cowboy and cattle camp crooner, William Alexander, a performer of Western music and folk songs from Western New South Wales, is set to release his latest album The Singing Stockman. Wait til you hear this.

And the list of new and on the way releases continues:

Willi Carlisle – Critterland. Released his third album in January. Produced by Daryl Scott.

William Elliot Whitmore - Silently The Mind Breaks

The Secret Sisters - Mind, Man, Medicine

Their fifth studio album, co-produced by the Secret Sisters, John Paul White, and Ben Tanner, and primarily recorded at FAME Studios in Muscle Shoals, Alabama.

Pernice Brothers - Who Will You Believe. It’s been a while, but so worth the wait.

By Denise Hylands

Alejandro Escovedo - Echo Dancing

Interprets his own work anew by recording completely new and repurposed versions of songs from his past.

Phosphorescent – Revelator.

First album of new material since 2018.

Colby T. Helm - Tales Of Misfortune.

21 year old Appalachian phenom, debut album. Old time, western, down home bluegrass country.

Adrianne Lenker - Bright Future.

Stepping aside Bright Eyes to release another solo project

Matt Joe Gow - The Woodshed Session

Live acoustic renditions of previously released songs.

John Craigie - Pagan Church

Recorded with the band TK & The Holy Know-Nothings. Touring Australia with Cat Clyde this March.

Waxahatchee - Tigers Blood.

Lo-fi alternative folk and country with a dash of scuzzy riffs. If something sounds like your thing, listen to it. If there’s a gig that piques your interest go to it.

Don’t let the good stuff pass you by. There’s so much good music happening it’s easy to miss something great.

Keep twangin’…

Alice Randall. Portrait by John Partipilo.

By Martin Jones

CHRIS DARROW ARTIST PROOF

Fantasy (reissued through Drag City)

What comes to mind if I present the name Chris Darrow? The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band? David Lindley and Kaleidoscope? Linda Ronstadt? Leonard Cohen? James Taylor? Ben Harper? Unbelievably, that’s just a small sample of the people Darrow played with as a musician’s multi-instrumentalist. Of particular interest to Rhythms and Bluesfest fans, Ben Harper recorded Darrow’s song ‘Whipping Post’ for his debut album. Darrow was friends with Harper’s mother and was a critical piece of Harper’s musical education growing up in Claremont, California.

“Chris was a deserved myth, a legend of Claremont,” Harper told JamBase. “He was one of the guys who had done it – he had gotten his music on record, out for the world to consume. It gave me something to attain, and it brought ambition, a goal and a dream into visible tactile terms, which is really important to a kid growing up. And with Chris, I could connect the recorded music with the man himself.”

Harper recalls how Darrow sat down and taught him how to play ‘Whipping Post’ note for note.

Artist Proof was Darrow’s first solo album, a glorious and slightly ragged amalgam of all his musical influences and experiences up to that point. Darrow spent time with David Lindley in The Dry City Scat Band and in Kaleidoscope; was close with Chris Hillman; was a member of The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band for two albums; formed The Corvettes who were produced by Mike Nesmith and who became Linda Ronstadt’s band; and recorded with Leonard Cohen, James Taylor, Hoyt Axton, John Fahey, and many more.

All those experiences bubble up on Artist Proof, a rocking, rumbling mixture of Dylan (in Nashville), The Band, The Byrds, The Stones, Neil Young, The Grateful Dead. There’s that loose, high energy feel to the performances, with Darrow recruiting some of his favourite musicians: including, guitarist Steve Cahill who was in Darrow’s very first band The Dry City Scat Band; steel guitarist Ed Black and drummer Mickey McGee, both from Ronstadt’s band; and, Arnie Moore and Loren Newkirk from John Stewart’s band.

The style is highly skilled Californian country rock of the best kind, not slick like The Eagles, more like Tonight’s The Night or American Beauty in tone. But it’s Darrow’s refined and inspired song writing that sets the album apart. From the moment opener ‘Beware Of Time’ launches, you know you’re in experienced hands; the shifts to half time, the honky tonk piano and fiddles, the hot guitars, and the huge chorus layered in harmony. Then ‘Lovers Sleep Abed Tonight’ subsides back into beautiful and vulnerable ‘Whispering Pines’ territory. Indeed, Darrow proves himself a master of the emotive ballad with ‘Move On Down The Line’ and ‘Son For Steven’.

But the upbeat songs are just as striking. ‘Alligator Man’ is Dylanesque in its phrasing, ‘New Zoot’ is Stones meets The Faces and ‘The Show Must Go On’ is reminiscent of The Dead’s take on bluegrass. Maybe the fact that Darrow ranged and borrowed so widely was the reason he was not as popular as many of his peers.

“The better the music is the harder you have to put it through the machine and force it out into the public eye,” Harper said. “Chris was just never really altogether interested in that and I applaud him for that. It never owned him. He’s a true rebel for that.”

Darrow’s music has since found new ears, his first three solo albums rereleased ten years ago. Ben Harper was part of a tribute concert to Darrow back in 2009 which Darrow was able to experience first-hand (he died in 2020).

“People have been saying things that I always wanted people to say about my music,” Darrow said at the time. “This has certainly put a new twist on my career and my life.”

BY KEITH GLASS

In the 60’s/70’s/80’s major record labels worldwide maintained a massive album release schedule. Only a comparatively few artists scored a hit, others became ‘cult’ classics. Beyond that exists an underbelly of almost totally ignored work, (much never reissued) that time has been kind to. This is a page for the crate diggers.

JACKIE DE SHANNON

LAUREL CANYON

IMPERIAL LP-12415 (1968)

The ‘First Lady’ of Laurel Canyon may well be Canadian born Joni Mitchell but Kentucky born Sharon Lee Myers (aka Jackie De Shannon) could give her a run for the money in the L.A ‘Hip’ hippie enclave stakes (if there was such a thing) not to mention a deceptive femme driving talent to create a lasting impression of creativity and excellence. Both are fine examples of what made this strip of elevated hilly land between the very flat areas of greater Los Angeles on one side and the San Fernando Valley on the other so important to the development of post rock n’ roll music. Zappa, The Doors, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young and many more incubated there and the list of artists influenced/touched by the Canyon still goes on today.

Just concentrating on the early years of De Shannon she started out as a 16-year-old rockabilly artist as Jackie Dee and caught the attention of Eddie Cochran who took her out of the South to California forming a writing team with his girlfriend Sharon Sheeley. The team wrote the hit ‘Dum Dum’ for the great Brenda Lee and remained friends and cowriters after the tragic death of Cochran.

Her first hits were the Sonny Bono - Jack Nitzsche classic ‘Needles and Pins’ and self-penned memorable ‘When You Walk In The Room’. There were more minor hits with Jackie making full use of her teen pop, rockabilly, gospel and country roots but ‘other people’ performing her songs were the big breadwinners. It was not until she recorded the Bacharach/David song ‘What The World Needs Now Is Love’ in 1965 that De Shannon become a semi-household name.

However, De Shannon was always a songwriter - not just a singer. So, by 1968 Los Angeles (and Laurel Canyon in particular) was the place for her to be. Many believe she was instrumental in the rise of FolkRock, she certainly embraced it but the list of artists migrating from Country and Folk to Rock is a long one, particularly on the West Coast. So, let’s just concentrate on the making of the Laurel Canyon album starting with the cover shot (and back cover) in and around “The Country Store’ a singular food/supply meeting place smack dap right in the middle of the Canyon. Literally everybody who’s anybody or nobody has been there including my good self. Admittedly, not until 1973. As a meeting place/landmark it’s pretty hard to beat and it is still there today. If you were traveling through from Hollywood to the Valley this was basically the only respite from the mainly twolane road. The back cover has Jackie ‘hitching a ride’; however, while this activity may have declined after the Manson murders the area retained its lustre with many current artists still in residence - no room to list here - look ‘em up.

Instead, let’s talk about some of the stellar cast on the album. Mac ‘Dr John’ Rebennack on piano, fellow NOLA native Harold Battiste on Keys, Paul Humphrey drums and Barry White along the vocal backing and very noticeable on certain tracks. It’s a mixture of originals (including the title track) and covers - Smokey Robinson’s seminal ‘You’ve Really Got A Hold On Me’, The Band’s ‘The Weight’ and even a B.W original ‘I’ve Got My Reason’ - White’s prominent B/V’s really raise the soul quota and make me want to hear more of this sort of work from him - totally sanctified and really good.

White bread Jackie is no slouch either and her cover of Cream’s ‘Sunshine Of Your Love’ is particularly soulful sandwiched inbetween her title track opener and one track after a song I surmise as a dedication to Sharon Sheeley - who married Los Angeles radio personality Jimmy O’Neil who created the TV show Shindig!

Jackie De Shannon is still with us and perhaps remains better known for many of her songs than her own performances - that’s a pity because as someone who has literally ‘done it all’ she’s pretty hard to top - there were many other high points in her career but the album Laurel Canyon stands up as a non-too serious relic from the hopeful late ’60’s California dream time. That’s a high worth having.

Jackie De Shannon: The Sherry Lee Show, two albums of early honky tonk recorded by her mother, are also available on Bandcamp.

TTHE CRICKETS THE CHIRPING CRICKETS

Brunswick (1957)

he Chirping Crickets, the only album Buddy Holly made with his band before he was given headline billing, was released in the US in November 1957 and in the UK and Australia early in 1958. Born Charles Hardin Holley in Lubbock Texas on September 3rd 1936, he was always known as Buddy to his family. As a young boy he learned piano, guitar and violin playing along with the country, gospel and R&B records on the family radio. (Hank Snow was a particular favourite).

Initially influenced by bluegrass he turned to rock and roll after seeing Elvis Presley on stage in Lubbock in 1955. Later he appeared on the same bill with Elvis and opened for Bill Haley & His Comets. After that show he was offered a recording contract with Decca Records where he cut a number of country singles in Nashville. One of his last recordings for the label, (Decca declined to release any of them) was ‘That’ll Be The Day’ which took its title from a line uttered by John Wayne’s character in the 1956 movie The Searchers

When Decca failed to release any of his recordings, Holly - whose public name was changed from ‘Holley’ to ‘Holly’ when he signed the Decca contract - returned to Lubbock to form his own band The Crickets.

With drummer Jerry Allison, 16-year-old double bass player Joe B. Mauldin and rhythm guitarist Niki Sullivan, Holly approached musician/producer Norman Petty who ran a recording studio in Clovis, New Mexico, close to the Texas border. It was here in 1957 that Holly would record the only album released in his lifetime, albeit without his name appearing on the front cover.

Now with Brunswick, a subsidiary of Decca, Holly was convinced that ‘That’ll Be The Day’ could be a hit with a rocked up arrangement and the addition of backing vocals. Finally satisfied with the new version, Petty (now Holly’s manager) played it to the head of Columbia Records Mitch Miller who told Petty, “Don’t waste your time on a group like this, they’II never make it.” Subsequently, Brunswick released it on June 9, 1957.

Six weeks passed before anything happened, but when it did, ‘That’ll Be The Day’, enhanced by Holly’s staccato guitar bursts and hiccough vocals shot to Number One on The Billboard singles chart.

The B-side, Holly’s ‘I’m Lookin’ For Someone To Love’, is another landmark recording with a guitar attack that predated similar Beatles’ recordings and an unusual lyricism not unlike Bob Dylan on songs such as ‘Subterranean Homesick Blues’. Holly sang “drunk man, streetcar, foot slip, there you are.” Sound familiar?

Anxious to release a Cricket’s album quickly, Petty assembled his backing singers who sounded a lot like Elvis’ Jordanaires and with Holly, Allison, Mauldin and Sullivan worked on a bunch of songs that included future hits ‘Maybe Baby’ and the randy ‘Oh Boy’, (“all of my life I’ve been waiting tonight there’ll be no hesitating”) both rockabilly classics. The B-side of ‘Oh Boy’, ‘Not Fade Away’, propelled by an irresistible Bo Diddley beat, would later be covered by The Rolling Stones.

By Billy Pinnell

The Chirping Crickets, unlike many long players of its day, is not a couple of hit singles and throwaway filler. There’s a cover of Chuck Willis’ R&B ballad ‘It’s Too Late’, two early Roy Orbison tearjerkers, ‘You’ve Got Love’ and ‘An Empty Cup’ and Lloyd Price’s ‘Send Me Some Lovin’, the B-side of Little Richard’s single ‘Lucille’. ‘Tell Me How’ and ‘Rock Me My Baby’ provide further examples of Holly’s innovative rhythm/lead guitar playing.

Unlike Presley and many other rock idols of the mid-fifties, Holly was a gifted instrumentalist who had grown up playing country music in Lubbock. Keen to move away from the rockabilly sound of his hits with The Crickets, and his solo recordings, ‘Peggy Sue’, ‘Every Day’, in October 1958 Holly left Petty and The Crickets and moved to New York’s Greenwich Village to record with producer, musician, arranger, orchestrator Dick Jacobs who had cut his musical teeth arranging for the Tommy Dorsey and Sy Oliver orchestras.

Jacobs was one of the first significant members of the mainstream pop music business to take rock music seriously, bringing his lush instrumental sounds to a number of rock and roll songs of the late 1950’s, one was Jackie Wilson’s ‘Lonely Teardrops’.

Shortly after arriving in New York, Holly reluctantly agreed to headline a multi-act rock tour in the middle of winter after finding out that Petty, who had erroneously claimed song writing royalties on many of Holly’s hits, had tied up his finances causing hardship for Holly and his pregnant wife of five months.

Conditions for the entire crew on the tour bus were abysmal. After another bus breakdown, Holly decided to charter a four seater light aircraft for himself and two of the tour’s other featured performers, Ritchie Valens and J.P.Richardson, The Big Bopper, to get to the next show on time. At about 2:00 a.m. on February 3rd, 1959, the plane crashed killing all on board.

Despite having played rock and roll music for only 16 months, Holly, 22 when he died, had created a blueprint for all rock artists who came after him. He wrote and arranged his own material, was the first to understand and experiment with studio technology achieving effects with echo, double tracking and overdubbing on primitive recorders. He also popularised the two guitars, bass and drums line-up.

He was the first rock and roller not to look like an Elvis clone, he was nerdy, wore horn rimmed glasses and was the first to make it on sheer talent, energy and personality.

As a songwriter, performer and musician, Holly created a template for virtually every major rock act to emerge in the 60’s and 70’s: Bob Dylan, The Beatles, (the first song The Quarrymen recorded as a demo was ‘That’ll Be The Day’). The Rolling Stones, Bruce Springsteen, Paul Simon, Eric Clapton and Pete Townshend have all freely admitted to being inspired by Holly while his catalogue of songs is still covered today.

CHATHAM COUNTY LINE HIYO

Yep Roc/Planet

CCL’s tenth studio album is the band’s first since the exit of ace banjoist Chandler Holt. His departure finds the remaining trio of Dave Wilson, John Teer and Greg Readling expanding their musical horizon well beyond their bluegrass origins. Traditional string instruments still permeate their new sound, but the introduction of electric instruments and percussion, as well as the deft hand of renowned Americana producer Rachael Moore, brings a more ethereal dynamic to the mix. At times reminiscent of an early Fleet Foxes early album, Hiyo is a vibrant affirmation of CCL’s continuing evolution beyond bluegrass; long may it continue.

VARIOUS ARTISTS

I SEE YOU LIVE ON LOVE STREET

Grapefruit/Planet

Laurel Canyon was the fabled idyllic creative playground that served as inspiration for scores of musicians who would develop, indeed define, west coast music. This outstanding 3-disc anthology traces the development of this somewhat incestuous musical enclave from 1967 through to 1975, a community of songwriters and performers who willingly collaborated with one another. Some, such as Joni Mitchell and the soon-to-be members of CSN&Y, are well documented, yet the Canyon also saw the likes of Frank Zappa, Jimmy Webb, Nilsson, and members of the Doors and Little Feat rub creative shoulders; they’re all here, living on Love Street.

By Trevor J. Leeden

WATCHHOUSE

AUSTIN CITY LIMITS LIVE AT THE MOODY THEATER

Yep Roc/Planet

Previously only available on limited release, this performance recorded just prior to the pandemic captures the duo formerly known as Mandolin Orange in stellar form. With a simpatico ensemble occasionally fleshing out the sound, life and musical partners Emily Frantz (vocals, fiddle) and Andrew Marlin (vocals, mandolin) delve into their catalogue going back to the bittersweet ‘There Was a Time’ from 2013’s This Side Of Jordan. Although the duo’s natural habitat is focused on sweet harmonies and deft acoustic picking, there’s still plenty of room to kick up a storm on the stirring ‘Gospel Shoes’ and the high-stepping hoedown ‘Hawk Is a Mule’. File next to Gillian Welch and Dave Rawlings.

VARIOUS ARTISTS

NINEY THE OBSERVER PRESENTS DREADLOCKS COMING TO DINNER

Cherry Red/Planet

During the halcyon days of reggae, Winston ‘Niney the Observer’ Holness forged a formidable reputation in his native Jamaica as well as the UK, firstly as a singer in his own right but predominantly as an innovative producer. The cream of Jamaica’s musicians beat a path to Niney’s door, a roster that included legendary artists such as Ken Boothe, Max Romeo, U Roy, Delroy Wilson and Big Youth. All appear on this 2-disc package of Observer singles from 1973 to 1975, including 15 tracks previously unavailable since their original release. Standouts are Boothe’s ‘Silver Words’, the Wilson rarity ‘Sugar Pie’, Horace Andy’s scintillating ’Nice and Easy’, and Michael Rose’s loping title track.

JANE GETTER PREMONITION DIVISION WORLD

Cherry Red/Planet

Sometimes it takes a dose of fullblown prog rock to clear the cobwebs, and the New York based guitarist’s latest is an exhilarating ride that bears all the essential touchstones of the genre. Getter and her crack sidemen (featuring former Testament and Miles Davis’ band members) deliver a heady fusion of metal, jazz, and prog, intricate rhythm patterns underpinning the fiery interplay between Getter’s Stratocaster and Adam Holzman’s keyboards. The standout is the bone jarring ‘Compass’, a thunderous instrumental that lies at the intersection of Jeff Beck and King Crimson. There is no more Beck or Crimson; Getter admirably fills their shoes.

VARIOUS ARTISTS

DO THE STRUM!

Cherry Red/Planet

The meticulous excavation and restoration of Joe Meek’s legendary Tea Chest Tapes continues, this time bringing the focus onto the girl groups and pop chanteuses of the 1960’s, performers often overlooked in the Meek canon. The box set includes every known A and B single, including previously unreleased gems amongst the lost classics. Familiar tracks from the likes of soul diva Glenda Collins, Eve Boswell and Honey Lantree (the singing drummer from The Honeycombs) stand beside (inexplicably) unreleased sides from the likes of Billie Davis, and brilliant beat groups like Flip and The Dateliners, The Sharades, and Diane And The Javelins; unearthed rarities include Pat Reader’s master tapes from 1962 that curiously only exist in stereo mix.

MARK TINSON’S STEELVILLE CATS LINK NATION Independent

When Link Wray’s thunderous D-Chord introduced his 1958 instrumental ‘Rumble’, he unleashed the power chord upon an unsuspecting public, forever changing the course of rock music and profoundly influencing generations of rock guitarists. Mark Tinson’s fascination with the Shawnee guitar god manifests itself in this crunching set of originals and subtly manipulated Wray tunes (including a guest vocal/harp appearance by the legendary Mike Rudd on a gritty version of ‘Crowbar’). Naturally, Tinson and his fellow partner in crime Brien McVernon stick closely to the Link template, and that means lashings of distortion, feedback, and tremolo-soaked riffs. Crank up the volume to eleven and, in the words of Link Wray: “GO NUTS!”

PROCOL HARUM

SHINE ON BRIGHTLY Esoteric/Planet

Whilst Procol Harum’s second album surprisingly didn’t set the world on fire in 1968, it was an important cog in the evolution of UK prog rock. Gifted guitarist Robin Trower’s arrival provided a high energy foil to Gary Brooker’s swirling keyboards and, in keeping with the genre, plenty of extended duelling solos. The apotheosis is reached on the final track ‘In Held Twas in I’, 18-minutes of spoken word, psychedelic, classicalinspired improvisations that raised the band’s stature on the ‘grandiose scale’, eclipsing even the Moody Blues. Shine On Brightly re-defined popular music and laid out the platform for the band’s 1969 masterpiece, A Salty Dog

By Zena O’Connor

The best way to understand the music scene in the Shoals is to know that it’s underpinned by three key characteristics that are linked to the music legacy of the town as well as the current crop of musicians and songwriters. The first of these is the fierce and determined authenticity of both the songwriting and musicianship of artists. In a small town that celebrates individuality, there’s no room for blatant or even covert imitation, considered anathema to the ongoing music legacy of the Shoals. Every songwriter in town is telling their story from their perspective, and the outcomes - both in terms of releases and live music performances - are remarkably distinct and unique as a result.

The authenticity in Gary Nichols’ songs reflect the highs as well as the lows of his journey, and his determination to live a better life. From lead singer and key songwriter in The Steeldrivers when Chris Stapleton departed in 2010, Nichols’ contribution to the band helped them win a Grammy for Best Bluegrass Album in 2015. However, this highpoint contrasts with the lows that Nichols subsequently experienced due to the destructive habits that nearly cost him his career and possibly his life. Nichols’ recent single This Time Around shares his passionate message of recovery for those locked into drug and alcohol abuse. Nichol’s blues-infused music and raw, gravelly voice elevates the song in an authentically distinctive way.

Similarly, Shoals native Taylor Grace does not hold back in revealing her innermost anxieties and innate understanding of the human condition in songs like To Hell With Guys, Balance and Familiar. Taylor’s voice, which has a wispy vulnerability reminiscent of Claudine Longet (especially her performance of Nothing To Lose from Peter Sellers’ film The Party), perfectly suits the introspective and revealing nature of her songs. Her regular co-writers, James LeBlanc, Angela Hacker and Mark Narmore, no doubt help Taylor draw on her experiences while ensuring that the emotions expressed in her songwriting appeal to a broad audience.

Another key characteristic of the Shoals music scene is crossgenerational collaboration, and it is so prevalent that I challenge the reader to nominate another music industry town where music is both written and performed across a large range of different generations, often featuring intermingled music genres. In the Shoals, this type of collaboration sees experienced musicians, songwriters and Grammywinners collaborating with much younger and less experienced musicians and songwriters. It is this type of collaboration that takes songs written by emerging musicians and songwriters and elevates them to a whole new level. The generosity of this type of collaboration neatly reflects the town’s dictum of ‘community over competition’.

A recent example is The Band Loula, a Georgia-based duo who record their music at Ivy Manor in the Shoals. Comprised of Malachi Mills and Logan Simmons, the duo initially emerged with a country/folk sound that underpinned their outstanding vocal harmonies. However, with the contributions of Grammy-winners Gary Nichols and Jimbo Hart as well as Shoals session drummer Evan Lane and touring/session bass-player Jamie McFarlane, The Band Loula’s recorded sound as well as live performances now have a richer, blues/bluegrass sound that enhances the powerful gospel vocal harmonies of the duo.

A similar story can be found in the music and performances of Australian musician Lucie Tiger who recently moved to the Shoals. A competent songwriter, Lucie’s music comes to life exactly as she

envisions with input of Bob Wray (who’s recorded with Johnny Cash, Roy Orbison, Willie Nelson, Chuck Berry, BB King and toured with The Highwaymen), Will McFarlane (Shoals session guitarist who toured with Bonnie Raitt 1974-1980), Justin Holder (#1 Shoals session drummer), and the supremely talented keys player Brad Kuhn. Half of the musicians are Lucie’s age and the other, a generation older and it is this mix of generations that helps Lucie to forge her own brand of southern rock that deftly melds the current sounds of Miranda Lambert with 1970s Lynyrd Skynyrd.

Another key characteristic of the Shoals music scene is the focus on current music with a respectful nod to the past. It’s impossible to live in the Shoals without bumping into ghosts from the past like the original batch of Swampers plus musicians and songwriters like Donnie Fritts and W.C. Handy as well as producers like Rick Hall and Sam Phillips. It is likely that the achievements of legendary figures such as these help to propel the careers of current musicians and songwriters to aim high. In a new development, the legendary La Fonda Jam Sessions are back in the Shoals. In its heyday, the La Fonda Jam occurred at a Mexican restaurant just east of downtown Florence on Highway 72. While it may have been an unlikely venue, it housed jam sessions for a decade and these featured the Iguana Party band, Jason Isbell and many other Shoals area artists. Reigniting this tradition, the first session featured some cool local musicians including Jimbo Hart, Barry Billings, Derek Coffman, Weston Harris Hill, Jay Burgess and Kevin Duane Reed. The Shoals is keen to have legendary La Fonda Jam Sessions back and they’ll be held each month at the Lava Room.

A weekly show that is not to be missed in the Shoals is Fathers & Sons at FloBama. A cross-generational band that has been playing for more than ten years, it features some of the best musicians in the Shoals and, because they’ve been playing together so long, the chemistry between them is to be seen to be believed. Will McFarlane is joined on stage by Kelvin Holly, who was the long-time guitarist and band leader for Little Richard plus played with the Amazing Rhythm Aces and Pegi Young among others. To hear the two guitarists trade riffs every Tuesday night in the Shoals is an absolute joy. The rhythm section is Will’s son Jamie McFarlane, who is considered one of the top bass guitar session musicians in town, and probably the #1 session drummer in the Shoals, Justin Holder. Noble C Thurman, who adds keys, played with Holly’s band The Decoys back in the 1990s and has

a stellar career as a songwriter, often collaborating with Scott Boyer of The Decoys as well as Shoals legends Donnie Fritts and Spooner Oldham.

Links with the legendary figures of the past are a huge and inevitable part of the music scene in the Shoals. However, the fierce authenticity

of current musicians, songwriters and producers in the town as well as their determination to make music on their own terms propels them to great heights on their creative journeys. It is likely that the Grammy quota for the Shoals is higher than most towns and will continue to grow due to the calibre of the music output of the Shoals now.

The Band Loula.

Photo by Zena O’Connor .

By Steve Bell

BILL

FAY GROUP (INC. MARLON WILLIAMS)

TOMORROW, TOMORROW & TOMORROW

Dead Oceans

If there’s anything more intriguing than an unsung artist from yesteryear belatedly getting their dues, it’s when an unsung artist from yesteryear belatedly getting their dues unearths a long-lost album.

Many moons ago now-revered UK folk singersongwriter Bill Fay released two idiosyncratic albums at the outset of his career - Bill Fay (1970) and Time Of The Last Persecution (1971)before being unceremoniously dumped by his label and for all intents and purposes falling off the face of the planet.

But for the next few decades while Fay wallowed in obscurity his small body of work kept resonating and built its own cult following. His first two albums were reissued in 1998, after which Fay was coaxed back into the spotlight for a second career phase which has spawned two compilations of early material and three well-received new studio albums.

the disconnection is between myself as a performer and the song, and not being afraid of that too. Just having faith in my own personality as an artist, I guess, to find a world that’s appropriate.”

But there also existed something of a white whale, a body of music which Fay had worked on for a number of years with some musician fans who’d tracked him down in the late-‘70s. The 20 completed songs never found a home at the time and lay gathering dust for over two decades until finally released on CD by a small label in 2005, this ‘new’ album - credited to the Bill Fay Group - titled Tomorrow, Tomorrow And Tomorrow

Now US indie label Dead Oceans - who have been curating Fay’s catalogue in recent years and striving to draw wider attention to his peculiar genius - are releasing the complete Tomorrow, Tomorrow And Tomorrow on 2-LP vinyl for the first ever time, and as part of their ongoing Bill Fay cover series have enlisted respected New Zealand singer-songwriter Marlon Williams to cover the album’s brutal but hauntingly beautiful track ‘After The Revolution’.

“It’s a weird song, isn’t it? He’s a very bizarre songwriter isn’t he, Bill Fay?” Williams chuckles. “He just concocts all of these different worlds and there’s obviously some very weird sort of Christian allegory going on in that song. But I just really liked the tone of it, so that’s why I chose that one, I guess.

“I was asked [by Dead Oceans] to select a song from Tomorrow, Tomorrow And Tomorrow to cover, and I just listened to them all and it wasn’t an easy decision. Some of them are just such bizarre sort of art pieces those songs, and they’re not always easy to find a way into - I sort of had to think very laterally about which one’s gonna be the world I was happy to take on.”

Williams’ incredibly-moving rendition of ‘After The Revolution’ doesn’t drastically alter the arrangement, but his spectral vocals make his version very much his own.

“One thing I’ve always been into is doing lots of different covers of different artists,” he explains. “I like just finding out of curiosity what

Despite Fay’s rising profile he remains (for now) very much a ‘musician’s musician’. Bands and artists like Wilco (who Williams admits was his gateway into the Fay universe), Kevin Morby, The War On Drugs, Stephen Malkmus (of Pavement) and Julia Jacklin have all either covered Fay or talked up his myriad charms (or both), beguiled and compelled by his willingness to place artistic considerations far above fiscal or career concerns.

“He’s an outsider artist,” Williams offers. “He’s not in it for the commercial aspect of things, and I think that’s why he appeals to so many musicians because he’s a freak. Yeah, to put it simply, he’s a freak and us other musical freaks resonate with that sort of place in the culture, I think.

“There’s a massive appeal in the bravery to push things in ways that are commercially futile. It’s uncompromisingly bound to fail commercially and that somehow gives it a real purity. I think that’s why a lot of musicians secretly wish that they had the artistic courage to do that, but life gets in the way and careers get in the way.”

As both an artist and a music fan Williams agrees that it’s wonderful that a beautiful piece of art like Tomorrow, Tomorrow And Tomorrow can be belatedly accepted into the world decades after its conception. “It’s just exciting that there’s still undiscovered music out there in this age of complete knowledge and sort of ‘internet sleuth-y domination’,” he grins. “The fact that there’s still these attics around the world with hidden gems that hopefully will just be unveiled into the world when it’s the right time so we can always have some ‘new old’ records coming out into the public domain.

“A lot of labels are being more comprehensive - especially the more boutique-y indie labels - and are sort of paying attention to that stuff because there’s a new market for it. There’s a lot of interest and intrigue into that kind of ‘lost music’, and it’s a great thing that those labels have moved into doing it genuinely, I think. There’s hope for us all.”

By Jo Roberts

WESLEY FULLER

ALL FULLER, NO FILLER

Cheersquad Records & Tapes

Could this be the most literally correct album title of the year?

On his second album, All Fuller, No Filler, Wesley Fuller plays every single note and beat. And across 13 distinctly different tracks, if you’re a fan of impeccable ‘60s-flavoured power-pop, you’ll agree there’s no passengers here. A fun pun of a title, but spectacularly accurate in its take on the ‘all killer, no filler’ cliche. All true.

Yet Fuller is possibly also one of the best-kept secrets in Australian music. Europe has been wise to Fuller for years, with glowing reviews and features in media ranging from Q Magazine to the BBC. He pricked the ears of notable A&R man James Endeacott (The Strokes, The Libertines), who signed Fuller to his 1965 Records label and released his first two records – the 2016 EP Melvista and 2017 debut album Inner City Dream

So, why isn’t he better known? He’s even managed by the elite Winterman & Goldstein group (The Living End, Something for Kate, the Avalanches), who clearly can pick a winner.

“To be fair, I did take quite a while out of music; I basically took four years off from the music scene, so that’s probably why I haven’t been on your radar,” explains Fuller. “For about four years I wasn’t doing anything, in a public sense anyway.

“I did a European tour at the end of 2018, came back to Australia and played a couple of shows … and then spent 2019 trying to knuckle down and get this album recorded. Then a few kind of life things popped up.”

Apart from changes in relationships and housing situations, there was also a pandemic to navigate. But Fuller spent the time doing home recordings at nights after his day job, assembling what would become All Fuller, No Filler. “I wanted to wait until things got a bit more back to normal in the music scene here before I re-launched things,” says Fuller.

The album’s opening track addresses this with both fact and intent. The strident and anthemic Back to Square One captures Fuller’s determination to make up for lost time, from crossroads both personal and global. “Back in the world, the physical world / back with a vengeance we come.”

It’s one of four singles already out ahead of the album’s March 15 release, along with House of Love (a tribute to his favourite haunt, Leonard’s House of Love in South Yarra), The Velvet Affair and Alamein Line. The latter is destined for many a future nomination in those ‘best songs about Melbourne’ lists so beloved of radio presenters. An absolute earworm of lush harmonies, humour and landmarks, the line “stumbling on to the concourse / how did I end up in Whitehorse?” will bring a knowing nod and grin from anyone who’s ever found themselves at odds with public transport navigation (yup, guilty).

Raised in Perth, Fuller wasn’t swayed by his own parents’ music taste – “they were too young for ‘60s music, they were in ‘80s stuff, which I hated” – and instead took himself down the ‘60s and ‘70s rabbit hole, which began around age 12 with the Beatles. He asked for a compilation album of their number 1s for Christmas.

“I became obsessed, learning every part of every song, and every harmony,” he recalls. “I used my pocket money to buy a new Beatles album every few months.”

From the Beatles, he progressed to artists including the Beach Boys, the Byrds, the Who, Todd Rundgren, The Zombies and T-Rex. “Throughout my early teens I was discovering all that great ‘60s stuff that is the foundation of my music, I would say.”

Along the way, Fuller became a multi-instrumentalist, starting with piano before moving on to self-taught guitar, then drums.

Not surprisingly, given his taste, Fuller ended up playing in a band with pop deity Dom Mariani (the Stems, Someloves, DM3, Datura4), as well as his own band, Hurricane Fighter Plane, which made its own impact with pop songs such as I Can’t Win, before Fuller moved to Melbourne in 2013.

He is chuffed when I tell him a song from his first album, #1 Song, reminds me of Redd Kross. “That’s a big compliment, thank you,” he says.

Fuller’s distinctive aesthetic extends to the visual too; think brightly hued suits, wide lapels, tinted sunnies, corduroy, Flying V guitars – and lately, a Jeff Lynne ‘fro. In the video for Alamein Line, he even manages to coordinate his threads with backdrops ranging from autumnal leaves to train upholstery (he insists it wasn’t intentional).

For fans of classic power pop, All Fuller, No Filler is a goldmine just waiting to be discovered. Wesley Fuller can’t stay a secret any longer.

By Jeff Jenkins

MARK SEYMOUR & THE UNDERTOW THE BOXER BLOODLINES

MARK SEYMOUR STEPS BACK INTO THE RING TO DELIVER ONE OF THE FINEST ALBUMS OF HIS CAREER.

“Rhythm is everything in boxing. Every move you make starts with your heart” – Sugar Ray Robinson

The last time I saw Michael Gudinski was at a Mark Seymour gig. But it wasn’t your typical sweaty pub, where you’d usually find Seymour and his label boss. Instead, it was in front of a city restaurant on a Saturday afternoon.

To rejuvenate Melbourne’s CBD, battered by Covid, Gudinski had organised a series of “pop-up” concerts. You could see the look of surprise on people’s faces as they looked up from their lattes and saw a guy with a guitar. “Hey, isn’t that Mark Seymour?”

The Mushroom founder, who was wearing a dirty old band T-shirt, stood on the street, arms folded, proudly smiling as he surveyed the scene, knowing that an artist he’d worked with for four decades was bringing some joy to a city he loved.

I mentioned to Gudinski how much I was enjoying Seymour’s Slow Dawn album. “Yeah,” the music mogul agreed in his gruff voice, “he’s one of the greats.”

Three years later, Mark Seymour & The Undertow have delivered The Boxer, the follow-up to Slow Dawn At a time when some of Seymour’s contemporaries have seemingly given up on making new music, he’s still punching. In this era of Spotify – where many critics are saying the album is dead – it would be easy to throw in the towel and say, as Roberto Durán did, “no más”.

But Seymour is still striving to make great art. He still believes.

“I fight for perfection” – Mike Tyson

“Do you achieve it?” – Charlie Rose, interviewer

“

Nah. No one does. But we aim for it.”

If you just scanned the titles of the first three songs here, you might think this is an angry rock record: ‘The Boxer’, ‘All My Rage’, ‘She Burned Her Bridges Down’.

Life can hit you pretty hard. But Seymour has somehow absorbed the blows and is still moving forward. As Jack Dempsey observed, “A champion is someone who gets up when they can’t.”

Ultimately, The Boxer is a fight for love. “Boxing taught me how to let go of anger and find self-respect,” Seymour explains.

“There are no angry songs on this record.”

“I’ve been running in the dark for too long,” he sings. “And all my rage will soon be gone.”

If you’ve ever seen Seymour on stage, you could easily mistake him for a boxer. A wiry welterweight. But he actually didn’t take up boxing until Covid lockdown. The sport taught him a few things about himself. “I started boxing for one set of reasons,” he admits, “then discovered the real ones later.

“Exercise turned to psychology: is your opponent controlling you, or are you doing it to yourself?”

One of boxing’s greatest quotes came from perhaps the sport’s most polarising figure, Mike Tyson: “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.”

Seymour’s vision has been brilliantly brought to life by producer Cameron McKenzie, the guitarist in The Undertow, Seymour’s band that also features John Favaro on bass, and Peter Maslen on drums, with Cameron Bruce on keyboards, and Eva Seymour on backing vocals.

Though it’s the most “musical” album of Seymour’s career, not a note seems out of place. The Undertow are a band that adeptly serves the song, showing that sometimes it’s the subtleties and the things left unsaid that give a song its power.

While listening to the record, I thought back to that gig in the city. As Seymour followed a Hunters & Collectors classic with a song from Slow Dawn, I looked over to Gudinski. His smile said it all. He looked like a proud dad, even though he was just four years older than the singer.

It was as if he was saying: yep, this guy is a legend – he’s a part of our culture – but you know what, his new stuff is just as good.

And he was right. The Boxer is an album that hits hard, though its power is in the gentle pull of The Undertow.

Hunters & Collectors was a massive machine. They called it “The Great Aussie Tug”, a reference to the roaring backbeat necessary in a pub environment. And in ‘Waiting On The Kid’, this album’s showstopping duet with Linda Bull, Seymour sings, “I’ve been guilty of coming on too strong.”

But with The Boxer, Mark Seymour is no longer afraid to show his sensitive side.

It’s an instant classic.

The Boxer is released April 19 on Bloodlines.

By Steve Bell

MADI DIAZ HISTORY OF A FEELING

ANTI-

Nashville-based singer-songwriter Madi Diaz had ridden the ups and downs of the music game for well over a decade before eventually striking pay dirt with her 2021 fifth album History Of A Feeling

That confessional batch of break-up songs really struck a chord with reviewers and punters alike, and she was suddenly not only selling out her own headlining shows all around the States but also being invited to tour with artists she’d long admired such as Angel Olsen and Waxahatchee.

She even spent three months in Europe opening for - and playing in the backing band of - UK pop superstar Harry Styles, an eye-opening experience which included opening solo to a sold-out Wembley Stadium (“it still doesn’t seem real to me, it’s crazy,” she laughs).

New album Weird Faith finds Diaz dealing with the start of a new relationship rather than a break-up - a scenario which can be just as emotionally challenging and prompt just as much self-examinationresulting in a batch of heartfelt songs just as intimate and vulnerable as those from its lauded predecessor.

“Weird Faith started out being much more like History Of A Feelingvery internal, a very inward-facing record - but I think by the end of it I realised that a lot of the questions that I’m asking aren’t completely directed at myself all the time,” Diaz reflects. “They’re more conversational between myself and another person, or myself and the world that we live in. So it felt like sonically it wanted more space and that the ceiling was much higher than I initially thought it was going to be.

“When I moved back to Nashville in late-2017, I wasn’t even really sure what my purpose or direction was as a songwriter - whether my songs were supposed to be for me or for other people or for other artistsbut I was just needing to process so much that was going on for myself personally.

“Whether I’m making records on a label or whether I’m like using a tape recorder in my kitchen, I’m always going to be writing songs and singing them, for me. So I think the intention with both History Of A Feeling and Weird Faith was just to have a very visceral representation of where I was personally in my life at that moment.”

Diaz admits being blown away with fan reaction to History Of A Feeling and this powerful connection that she suddenly had with her fans.

“It was a surprise. It still catches me off guard,” she smiles. “I never thought that people would show up to any city having spent any time with songs that I’ve written, especially with how narrow I went really on that record - it was just me that I was talking about, I wasn’t trying to speak for anybody.

“I felt just totally bewildered by just how beautiful this shared experience could be. I was just having to be brave for myself and mine my own grief and kind of turn it over until I was done with it, but then showing up to cities and having people sing these songs back at me is just like, ‘What? How?’”

Every song on Weird Faith is a co-write with at least one other songsmith, not unusual in a music city like Nashville.

“It’s funny, I feel super-fortunate to live in a city where I trust so many of my friends with my innermost personal thoughts,” she tells. “I love my community and I’d die for my community. It is kind of a Nashville

thing, but I’ve been here pretty much since 2007 which was pretty early on in my career and it just became like a muscle that I have been so accustomed to. I’ve seen so much friendship and power and joy and really only good things that I’ve experienced with collaboration, thankfully.

“It’s funny, I think in the last year I’ve finally come back to writing by myself a little bit and finished a couple songs by myself for the first time in, oh my god, a decade. So I’m excited to start to grow that muscle back too.”

On heart-wrenching Weird Faith ballad ‘Don’t Do Me Good’ Diaz was even lucky enough to be able to call on the sublime talents of country star Kacey Musgraves, who added her dulcet tones to the track.

“Oh my god, I adore Kacey, I really do,” she gushes. “She’s a real one and I respect her so much, just in her own artistry - just watching her over the years she does not fuck around and she only does what she wants to do. So I really didn’t take it lightly when I was asking her and I didn’t take it lightly when she said ‘yes’!

“She really made that song a lot less lonely and so much warmer and just much more loving than I think it would have been otherwise. That song’s pretty sad when it’s just one person facing a mirror and singing it to themselves, and to have somebody like Kacey on the other side of the telephone line was a pretty big, it was special.”

By Michael George Smith

RICK HART IN THE MIDNIGHT SKY ALONE

Independent

It’s been six years between albums for country/Americana singer-songwriter Rick Hart, and while there’s been the obvious inevitable pandemic-related delays, for him it was a more directly personal loss that totally knocked him for six. Thankfully, he finally got back on track and is now hitting the road to present his second album, In the Midnight Sky Alone, as he explained to Rhythms

“In 2018,” Hart begins, “after we’d done all the touring and so forth for the first album, Let Me In, I guess my right-hand man and good friend, the guitarist with my band Rick Hart and the Sweet Addictions (Tom Fauvette), sadly passed away and, you know, I just couldn’t see myself playing in a band again. I still gigged around, playing the acoustic shows and duo shows, and I was still always writing songs, but it just took a long while to get back into the mindset of being part of a band, which I love.”

Hart credits his father for the direction his musical journey has taken, one that’s from a time long ago and far away, as it were. After all, 1940s and ‘50s Memphis is a long way from 1990s Melbourne. “I definitely consider myself a little bit of a throwback,” Hart admits, “certainly in terms of influences and inspiration, where I gravitate when I listen to music. I’m not saying I don’t like a lot of the contemporary stuff, but I was lucky that my dad was musical, so I grew up hearing a lot of his records, bands like Creedence and the Beatles but also a lot of country records – Merle Haggard, Marty Robbins, Buck Owens. They were staples in our house. Then you listen to the guys that they talk about, so I’m a big fan of the likes of Lefty Frizzell, Hank Williams obviously and those sorts of artists, but also Elvis and Chuck Berry and things like that. I guess I’ve always loved that music. But I’m also a mad Rolling Stones fan, so they’ve always been a constant. My taste in music is quite expansive, but it so happens I sort of write along the lines of country sort of roots realm.”

The Wildes’ Damian Caffarello and Lachlan Bryan co-produced the album with Hart and helped him cull the substantial list of songs he brought to the table down to the 11 on it. “It was really about what hung together well as an album,” Hart explains, still a big fan of the form. “What they were trying to capture was the songwriter.”

The songwriter that the album presents is a storyteller of the heart, though he’s quite possibly alienated a sizeable chunk of his potential audience with his cheeky ditty titled ‘Your Name Don’t Rhyme with Heartache’. The guilty party? A girl named Alison. “The amazing thing with that song,” Hart chuckles, “I always say if there are any Alisons in the audience, please don’t take this personally and come up and see me and I’ll give you a free copy of my last album. In all the gigs there’s been just one Alison! That song – I love titles – and I wanted it to be overtly country, with a honkytonk feel and influence, so I always intended it as a play on female names. Sometimes someone will come up afterwards and say I mentioned their name so do they get a CD!”

Of course, the rest of the album is far less frivolous, with songs about everything from, as Hart explains, “faith or struggling with vices, real positivity with songs like ‘Onward and Upward’ and more solemn moments like ‘Our Little Secret’, about an affair – nothing I’ve had or

experienced but written from observation. My wife, who sings with me, always says when we play it, ‘Just be sure this is not about him or me’” he laughs. Vanessa Hart provides the duetting voice in ‘The Dam That Holds Your Tears’ and provides backing vocals across the album. The voice that duets with him on ‘For the Birds’ is “my super-talented niece, Alysia Gomez, who sang a song with me on the last album. I’ve written songs where I wanted Vanessa to be the lead vocalist with me as backing singer – she’s an amazing singer – and she’s coming around to that notion (laughs) but she’s not quite there yet. She loves doing harmonies.”

Hart wrote a song, ‘Shine Your Light’, for his late friend and guitarist, which became the title of an EP he released in 2018 that included three songs, two of them live, that highlighted Fauvette’s playing. With that, he laid the Sweet Addictions to rest. When Hart goes out with a band nowadays, it’s with the Silver Dollar Band. Alongside Hart in the Silver Dollar Band are Jake Underwood on electric guitar, Brendan Mitchell on pedal steel, Greg Field on fiddle, Paul Robertson on bass and Luke Callaghan on drums and Vanessa of course on backing vocals.

“I think the thing that drew me back to wanting to be in a band again is that eighteen months ago I formed a honkytonk country covers band called No Sleep Till Texas, which became a really nice reintroduction to playing with a band again. We’ve played some great shows and festivals. In fact, that’s another reason it took so long to get around to doing my own stuff – I was having so much fun with them. I’ve also been writing songs for No Sleep Till Texas but it’s still more of an ode to our heroes.”

If you’re interested to learn more about the evolution of Rick Hart as a songwriter, he’s gone back to his archives, dusted off the master tapes and released the album he recorded with his first band, Heathen Sway, back before they split in 2006, that hadn’t seen the light of day, Lights Out. “I sang with cover bands throughout the ‘90s, which was a lot of fun, but by the turn of the century it just wasn’t sparking me. I was dabbling more and more in my own writing and it was Vanessa who said I should get out there and start doing my songs.”

By Chris Lambie

GREG ARNOLD AND THE SUBURBAN DAYDREAMERS IN THE SKY

Unagi Sound

Greg Arnold has been making music for a long time. The singersongwriter with Things of Stone and Wood is also a successful solo artist. But when he and wife Helen (she of iconic hit ‘Happy Birthday Helen’) settled in Switzerland for eight years, Arnold wondered if his life in music may have run its course. This, despite his PhD in songwriting and an APRA Songwriter of the Year award. “In the earliest years there, I’d only written one or two songs,” he recalls. “I started to think, ‘Oh well, that’s something I used to do. It was fun, but that’s that.’ And then…it absolutely came flooding back.” He began working with TOSAW on a new album in 2020 - a project put on hold by the tyranny of distance in pandemic times. Now based back in Australia, Arnold’s 5th solo album In the Sky proves his career is far from done. “I wrote songs for the TOSAW album and a whole other acoustic-ish album came from that. Plus, In the Sky and a sort of power pop band as well.”

In The Sky chronicles personal reflections alongside universal themes. “When you sing about what you’re really feeling and thinking, it shows. And to embrace the broader culture and open your eyes to what’s going on around you.”

Acknowledging his own ‘white middle-class guy privilege’, he writes with empathy and evolving insight. From ‘Songs Of Sorrow’: “I was young, so entitled / A golden life before me on a platter / I could hear the weeping in the laneways / I turned my back / I didn’t think it mattered.” ‘Until The Rain’ salutes the resilience of an outback town enduring yet another drought. ‘Troubled Skies’ (co-written with Carlyle Christopherson) captures the haunting weight of anxiety. “It’s important to try to understand things someone sees differently to the way I do. I suppose it’s related to ‘Churchill’s Black Dog’ by TOSAW. When you’re not in that moment, but having understanding for others. When I see the blue in the sky and someone else sees storm clouds.”

With Arnold’s instantly recognisable vocals, In The Sky also signals a new direction. “We were rehearsing with a producer I work with a lot in Switzerland, Toby May. We were getting ready to launch his album which had a bit of an 80s band sound to it. So, I had all these classic guitar pedals from the 80s and things. Between rehearsals, we end up writing a lot of new songs. It’s a kind of alternative history. Harking back to the 80s when I moved away from the band I’d been in and went very acoustic at that point. But I could well have gone to the place that In The Sky has gone to. The big-hearted guitars and epic emotion of the 80s. Arnold felt a ‘young band enthusiasm’ while working on the album in Geneva. Co-producer May is a Scottish-Swiss multi-instrumentalist. “We just smashed it out. It was a real fulfilment of the work Toby and I had done for his and other peoples’ work. We put together this sound with fantastic French drummer Stef Roul.” Roul has played as in-house session drummer for Dave Stewart (The Eurythmics) and toured with Andrew Eldritch (The Sisters Of Mercy) and boy band East 17.

In The Sky features Arnold on Telecaster. “I was biting the bullet, getting back into a delay sound. I’d dodged that for years but I loved it. The Oils, Tom Petty and U2 in that era. There’s such a feeling to it.” Keyboards, as on the moody ‘Blown Away’, expand the retro feel. “That song is a flagship for the album. In the overall theme, I always feel like it was a 70s guy who just managed to sneak into the 80s band. I started out playing piano but moved across to guitar largely because you could jump around more. No matter how often Flock of Seagulls did their fancy synthesiser moves, I wasn’t feeling it.”

Indeed, Arnold’s lyrics can stand as poetry by themselves. “That’s always been an aspiration of mine,” he says. “Particularly with the second TOSAW album Junk Theatre. I wanted people to be able to read this from start to finish, a journey not attached to the music. Although I love that they’re songs. I had a fantastic experience as an Artist-InResidence at the Peninsula Hot Springs and spent that week reflecting on and editing these lyrics. I started out as a classic teenage guy songwriter. All about the music. Looking for ways to squeeze words into my melodies. [Resulting in] an unending stream of plot holes,” he laughs. “I remember getting this real kick when I got with Helen; she was a poet and we’d go to readings. I was studying English Literature at the time. I learnt that if you’re not feeling a lyric, you don’t have a song. Go back and wait til you do.”

‘You Can’t Bring Me Down Today’ encourages artists to stand their creative ground. “Someone might get 99 great reviews but always remembers the one bad one.” It’s a vulnerable space but fundamental to the process. “As much as it’s a bit ouchy, I think it’s how we should approach this songwriting caper. Sometimes a funny image gets in your head. This one made me think of the movie Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid. The idea of being hunted down.”

Future gigs promise a mix of new material and classics from Arnold’s back catalogue. He still gets a buzz singing ‘Happy Birthday Helen’ “That conversation with the audience is that conversation every night. One of the greatest compliments I’ve had was from musician Pete Hayden. He said, ‘I’ve seen you do that song about a thousand times and I’ve never seen you dial it in’.”

‘Tick Tock (Running Down the Clock)’ is a seize the day song with a buoyant rhythmic momentum. “When we got back to Australia, I was doing the TOSAW acoustic tour which was an absolute delight.” The Arnold’s two kids had left school, embarking on the great gap year tradition. The couple were inspired to follow suit. “Helen and I travelled around and really got to understand Australia again. And that feeling of being back home.”

MICHAEL MEEKING THE NIGHT AIR

Independent

Michael Meeking’s work has long been championed by community radio legend Neil Rogers on Triple R. “Not only a gifted songwriter and performer, the hard-working Michael Meeking is one of the genuinely decent people floating around in this thing called the music industry,” Rogers says.

Meeking’s sense of communion leaps from the speakers on his latest album, The Night Air man and woman.

The opening cut, ‘Anything You Need Me To Do’, wouldn’t have been out of place on Springsteen’s ‘Don’t Miss A Good Thing’ will have you thinking of the late-great Tom Petty. Meeking’s characters are beat-down and blue but they soldier on in the belief that things will get better, that the night air will perhaps deliver something surprising and new. The Melbourne artist sings about people who are somehow still standing, “ the radio”, looking for “ one more try through”. Show a little faith, there’s magic in the night.

(5.36)

guitars / Sean Albers - drums, /Chris Wilson - harp / Shane percussion / Grant Cummerford

Sean Albers - drums, /Chris Wilson - harp / Shane percussion / Grant Cummerford

Girls

Meeking and producer Roger Bergodaz (Raised By Eagles, Lost Ragas, Tex Perkins, Suzannah Espie) played pretty much everything on the record, but the result sounds like there’s a great band blazing away in

Dan Lethbridge (6.07)

Lethbridge (6.07)

Banquet

acoustic guitar / Shane O’Mara backing vocals / Ash Daviesb.v.’s.

Barker (4.38)

Stones

Rolling Stones

acoustic guitar / Shane O’Mara backing vocals / Ash DaviesBarker Garner - guitar, backing vocals/ Wilson - harp / Bruce Haymes bass /Ash Davies - drums.

Garner - guitar, backing vocals/ Wilson - harp / Bruce Haymes bass /Ash Davies - drums.

Soup (W. Dixon) - Loretta Miller (4.03) O’Mara – guitars / Rick PlantDarcy McNulty - baritone sax.

Dixon) - Loretta Miller (4.03) O’Mara – guitars / Rick PlantDarcy McNulty - baritone sax. Stones Now!

26th~28th APRIL 2024

26th~28th APRIL 2024

Stones Now!

Garner (4.17)

DAN SULTAN | TROPICAL F*CK STORM

DAN SULTAN | TROPICAL F*CK STORM

Nick Barker - backing vocals / backing vocals / Grant Cummerford -

Nick Barker - backing vocals / vocals / Grant CummerfordSoup (LIVE) - Nick Barker & The Garner - guitar / Shane O’Marabass / Ash Davies - drums / Music Club, on Let It Bleed

KID CONGO & THE PINK MONKEY BIRDS | EMILY WURRAMARA

KID CONGO & THE PINK MONKEY BIRDS | EMILY WURRAMARA

RVG | COTERIE | THE LACHY DOLEY GROUP | HARD-ONS

RVG | COTERIE | THE LACHY DOLEY GROUP | HARD-ONS

GARETH LIDDIARD ( ) | DALLAS CRANE | BATTLESNAKE

Soup (LIVE) - Nick Barker & The

GARETH LIDDIARD ( ) | DALLAS CRANE | BATTLESNAKE

TEENY TINY STEVIES | VAUDEVILLE SMASH | BULLHORN

TEENY TINY STEVIES | VAUDEVILLE SMASH | BULLHORN

CLAIRE ANNE TAYLOR | THE BURES BAND | BURGER JOINT

CLAIRE ANNE TAYLOR | THE BURES BAND | BURGER JOINT

THE MAIN GUY & THE OTHER GUYS | CHIMERS | MARVELL

Garner - guitar / Shane O’MaraCummerford - bass / Ash Davies - drums / Music Club, Originally on Let It Bleed

THE MAIN GUY & THE OTHER GUYS | CHIMERS | MARVELL

MELODY POOL | KARL S WILLIAMS | JOE MUNGOVAN | QUEENIE

MELODY POOL | KARL S WILLIAMS | JOE MUNGOVAN | QUEENIE

RADIUM DOLLS | CHECKERBOARD LOUNGE | MAGPIE DIARIES

RADIUM DOLLS | CHECKERBOARD LOUNGE | MAGPIE DIARIES

DAVE WELLS | SALARYMEN | JET CITY SPORTS CLUB

DAVE WELLS | SALARYMEN | JET CITY SPORTS CLUB

DON’T THANK ME, SPANK ME | GEORGIE WINCHESTER SPECIAL

DON’T THANK ME, SPANK ME | GEORGIE WINCHESTER SPECIAL

JOEY LEIGH WAGTAIL | JUNIOR BURGER | BUTTERKNIFE

Shane O’Mara, all the album, Mick, Keith, Brian, Chuck, Bobby, Bernard,

thank Shane O’Mara, all the album, Mick, Keith, Brian, Chuck, Bobby, Bernard, Sally

JOEY LEIGH WAGTAIL | JUNIOR BURGER | BUTTERKNIFE

PLEASE WELCOME TO THE STAGE... WONNARUA COUNTRY, HUNTER VALLEY • DASHVILLE.COM.AU

SF WRENS | SITTING DOWN | DASHVILLE PROGRESS SOCIETY YOUNG GUMS YOUTH MENTORSHIP SHOWCASE

SF WRENS | SITTING DOWN | DASHVILLE PROGRESS SOCIETY YOUNG GUMS YOUTH MENTORSHIP SHOWCASE

Produced

By Bernard Zuel

JO CASELEY

HIGH ON HEARTSTRINGS

Independent

Jo Caseley is happy, she’ll tell you: love renewed with her husband of nearly two decades (“he’s a very honest, country, what you see is what you get, absolute no bullshit [type] which is probably what a lot of my music is about.”), kids close (her son is starting out as a rodeo roper and she’s working out how to coordinate her gigs, his gigs and the family’s love of travelling), and her third album, High On Heartstrings, is out and proud.

But she’ll also tell you that at times it was a shitfight getting here, even if now she sounds like someone who is secure, who understands herself and where she fits.

“That is how I wanted the album to be perceived. I want other people to be able to experience what I’ve experienced: don’t give up, don’t lose hope, you will find a way to make things work in your life.

But you have to remain true to yourself and true to your heart, and be that complete person you need to be. And that took me so long to learn, even how to be a really authentic and truly myself with my husband,” Caseley says.

“I always felt I had to be this other person he wanted me to be: Jo the bookkeeper, and Jo the employer, and Jo running the business. That’s who he really wanted me to be, and for me to actually say yes I will support you but there is more to me than that, and have to be allowed to be that woman, and if you take that away from me I can’t be all those other things that you want me to be.”

Now she says her art is “delivered from a place of strength”. That strength has allowed her to say things on this record outside the usual safe areas of Australian country songwriting and the safe topics of country conversation. Like ‘Sorry, about the Stolen Generations’ (written in part to address her conservative father and his generation), and especially ‘Special’, a song that speaks of domestic violence in the clearest way with lines such as “You can’t fly so you crawl, you’re worth nothing at all/You’re a psycho a freak, shut your mouth up don’t speak”.

Citing the example of one of her heroes, Loretta Lynn – “she wrote the truth” - Caseley argues that “I can’t sugarcoat things and be someone that I’m not.” But at the same time she confesses songs like ‘Special’ were never intended for public airing

“It was written as more a diary entry, a very secret diary entry, and written as a cathartic process in order to deal with my emotions,” she says. “I didn’t have a voice. I didn’t have a voice in my marriage, I couldn’t say how I felt, so the only place I was free to speak my mind was in my song. I could sing it privately, in my bedroom, and doing that gave me great peace and comfort because I got it out of my system.”

What changed it from a secret song to a public one was a weekend she spent at a women’s retreat where “they were all there to heal” and tell

their stories, with Caseley as the entertainment.

“But a lot of women in their 40s, I found, had the same story: they’d grown up living a life for their parents or for their husband or for their children or for everybody else, and along the way they’d lost themselves,” she says. “They had traumas in their life that they had never dealt with and all of a sudden they had no selfconfidence, were scared to do things, full of anxieties and really that feeling of all the labels that you put on yourself: I’m too ugly, I’m too fat, I’m not good enough. Or my songs aren’t good enough, or my voice isn’t good enough, or people aren’t going to like my music.”

This revelation, this understanding, and the insistence of the women on the retreat she had to put these songs out, changed everything. Thinking about it now, Caseley describes ‘Special’ as “a song about climbing back, about finally learning to get a voice and finally learning to say throughout the putdowns and everything, you know what? I am special and I’m going to get back everything you have stole off me”. But just as she is clear about where she has been and what she has been through, Caseley is equally adamant that this can only be a part of her story and that of her husband in a relationship that is stronger –“I’ve taught him and he’s taught me” – and more filled with love than ever.

“I don’t know if it was wrong or right [to stay in the darkest periods] but I do know that now my husband has matured and has become an adult and is a lot better – he was like, okay I really have to step up, and he has – and I have got a voice in my marriage,” she says.

“That’s pretty much what all of us did. We all started with careers of our own, dropped those careers when the kids came along, stayed at home, did all the book work and everything for our husbands’ businesses and were mothers. None of us really continued our paths until now. Now it’s my time.”

By Steve Bell

PINKERTON PENDLEBURY PINKERTON PENDLEBURY

INDEPENDENT

Given the pedigree of new Melbourne-based project Pinkerton Pendlebury it’s little surprise that their eponymous debut album is a beguiling collection of sophisticated pop music, its songs ambitious in scope but rendered timeless by the pair’s inherent chemistry and impeccable delivery.

Despite possessing an already lengthy history in the then-vibrant scene, veteran guitarist Andrew Pendlebury first came to real prominence when he joined a fledgling line-up of inner-city icons The Sports and helped drive their fertile late-‘70s/early-‘80s heyday.

Then when The Sports reformed in 2017 and called on the drumming services of Steve Pinkerton - the erstwhile front man of excellent noughties pop-rock purveyors The Anyones (as well as a member of The Ronson Hangup and, recently, Dallas Crane), who was already a huge fan of the band - the pair hit it off like the proverbial house on fire, both musically and personally.

Naturally they began meeting up just to jam for fun at Pinkerton’s home studio, and when song ideas inevitably began to flow a new musical partnership was born.

“What you hear is roughly made out of jams, and Steve picks and chooses bits and pieces that capture his attention,” Pendlebury explains. “He’ll either put vocals to it immediately or he’ll get me to come back in and redo some parts, then when he’s done he sends me a file and I’m constantly just blown away with what he’s concocted. It always sounds amazing.

“I’ve been in so many musical situations with people and bands in big studios where you can spend a week on one song getting the bloody tom-tom sound on the drum or the bass sound and it’s just completely ridiculous. Whereas Steve’s got this little studio in his house and did an incredible job with the production. It was really organic.”

While the album adeptly mines the pair’s shared pop sensibilities, Pinkerton explains that to him the material sounds rooted in a particular time period.

“It’s really interesting because you never know how people’s styles are going to mesh,” he offers. “There’s a slight age difference between us but we still have that sort of common ground in melodic pop stuff

“I wasn’t sure if Andrew would still be holding on to that or if he’d moved on, but when he did these little riffs on ‘Molly Dean‘ - one of the first songs we did - he came up with this amazing catchy riff, which sounds very much to me like straight out of 1974.

“So instantly my ears pricked up and it made it easy to write. It was very much a Johnny Marr/Morrissey relationship, he’d do these little

riffs and I’d be inspired and then come up with the melody and then lyrics. And then sometimes he’d come up with a song that was almost completely the bare bones, even with almost a middle eight, and I could just sing over the top of it.”

The results are somehow both familiar yet wholly uniquesome tracks reminiscent of The Anyones in places with their brazen melodicism and haunting, immersive choruses - each song augmented by deft guitar flourishes that add immense heft without ever threatening to become too prominent or overbearing.

“That’s entirely my guitar approach, guilty as charged” Pendlebury smiles. “I’m absolutely into serving the song and not being too upfront or in your face with what I do.”

“I always think he’s a very Keith Richards-like in his approaches like that and he has these great insights, which is just like a dream for me,” Pinkerton continues. “It sounds like I’m playing with Keith Richards next to me, it really does. It’s like I get to play alongside one of my favourite musicians, I feel really spoiled.

“It feels like there’s a real consistency to proceedings in that it’s rooted in a roundabout way in the early-‘70s, and it sounds to me very much like Goats Head Soup or the Black and Blue Album by The Rolling Stones because of the blues-inspired guitar. That places it firmly in the late-‘60s and early-70s, so that’s how I see it. I love those guitar sounds.”

Not long after that recent reformation The Sports were rocked by the tragic passing of long-term guitarist Martin Armiger, and Pendlebury is rapt that he can use this new vehicle to help keep alive the memory of his departed friend and bandmate.

“We lost Martin a few years ago, and on a few of the new songs I kind of had Martin in mind because we got on so wonderfully together in The Sports,” he reflects. “There was never any sort of competitive stuff creatively. Martin usually came up with these amazing, completed songs, and me and Steve Cummings were the other half of the writing equation.

“So as a tribute we’re planning on doing a couple of songs in our next live get-together. We’ve sung ‘Strangers On A Train’, we do ‘How Come’ and we’re going to do ‘Suspicious Minds’, a few of The Sports’ songs just as a tip of the hat to Martin. He couldn’t deserve it more.”

By Nick Corr

SIERRA FERRELL TRAIL OF FLOWERS

Rounder Records

West Virginia-born, Nashville-based singer/songwriter/ multi-instrumentalist Sierra Ferrell should be no stranger to Rhythms readers. She’s toured Australia three times, headlined the Out on The Weekend festival, and even graced the Rhythms cover for our October 2022 issue. Following considerable acclaim for her 2021 Rounder Records debut Long Time Coming, the jingle-janglin’ gypsy has finally released her anticipated new album Trail of Flowers.

The first thing you hear on the record is distant strumming and Sierra’s voice singing scales on what sounds like an Alan Lomax field recording, before slowly coming into focus for the album opener ‘American Dreaming’. This intro to the album is a good metaphor for the record itself which, like its predecessor, features Sierra’s inimitable voice front and center but also steps up the production. “With this record I wanted to make a fuller sound with bigger drums, but still stay true to the stripped-down feel of old-time music whenever it felt right,” says Ferrell. “I wanted to create something that makes people feel nostalgic for the past, but excited about the future of music.”

The nostalgia comes through most strongly on her harmonica-laced cover of Fiddlin’ Arthur Smith 1930s tune ‘Chittlin’ Cookin’ Time In Cheatham County’. There’s also a very old time feel to the galloping rhythms of the fiddle-led first single ‘Fox Hunt’. “That song’s my ode to how people had to survive back in the day, before you could go out to the supermarket and grab what you need—back when you had to preserve food, tend your garden, go hunting and bring home an animal and respectfully use every piece of it,” says Ferrell. “It’s my tip of the hat to where we came from, compared to where we are now.”

Mainly recorded at Sound Emporium Studios in Nashville, Trail Of Flowers came to life with producer Eddie Spear (Zach Bryan, Brandi Carlile, Chris Stapleton) with additional production by Gary Paczosa (Alison Krauss, Dwight Yoakam, Gillian Welch). The record also features some notable guest appearances such as Nikki Lane providing backing vocals on the swinging second single ‘Dollar Bill Bar’. A wistful romantic tale with the protagonist hoping for love, but anticipating the worst “if I had a dollar for every single cowboy’s heart / I could break a hundred down at the Dollar Bill Bar”.

Interestingly, two of the stand-outs songs on the record, ‘Dollar Bill Bar’ and ‘American Dreaming’, are both co-written by Ferrell with her friend and frequent collaborator Melody Walker (Molly Tuttle, Della Mae, Lindsay Lou). ‘American Dreaming’ is a particular highlight, the world-weary track featuring backing vocals by Lukas Nelson, and speaks to the struggle to build a good life in a culture consumed by capitalism. As Ferrell explains “In my situation, I end up being out on the road so much that I don’t get to spend a lot of time in my own home, taking care of my cat and dog and watering my plants and cooking meals on my stove. I’m always so excited and thankful to play music for people, but sometimes it feels hard to be gone all the time.”

The gothic story-song ‘Rosemary’ provides a change of pace, mostly acoustic with some very subtle organ and bass, and even a few bars of yodeling. “The way that song came together was a funny thing,” Ferrell recalls. “I was eating some rosemary bread with good olive oil and I thought, ‘I love rosemary bread so much that I have to write a song about it’—so then I wrote a murder ballad.”

My highlight of the record is ‘Lighthouse’ a delicate mandolin led ballad, rich with harmony vocals and the plain-spoken request, “could you be the lighthouse for my soul?”. Other stand-outs include

the ridiculously catchy “I Could Drive You Crazy” led by traditional sounding fiddle and sparce drums. The songs finale finds time to blend in a recording of the crowd howling at Sierra’s New Year Eve show, as Ferrell explains “I always love getting everyone to howl at my shows— it’s a good, free feeling.”

Existing fans of Sierra Ferrell are in for a real treat with Trail of Flowers. It has everything you have loved about her previous work, old-timey sounds, shifting tempos, eccentric musicality but mostly her incredible voice in fine form. Trail of Flowers bigger production and welcoming sound make the record an accessible entry point for newcomers to come and see what the fuss is all about.

ALBUMS: General

KILO BAND

KILO BAND

Independent

As John Swan, one half of studio duo Kilo Band, explains the process of making this release, “This is our own project, just Mark in Nashville and me in Coffs Harbour working via Zoom.” The Mark in question is Queensland-born Nashvillebased musician and producer Mark Moffatt, who first worked with Swan on the latter’s Into the Night album, and the resulting six songs really are a labour of love from both men. The slow-grinding ‘Did It Really Hurt’ with Moffatt’s blistering Jimmy Page-soaked guitar solo running into a double-time mid-section, and the rambling ‘Someday’ were both born of jam sessions Moffatt had with the late Oils bass player ‘Bones’ Hillman and former Counting Crows drummer Steve Bowman some years ago. The sessions were resurrected after Hillman’s passing and reflect both Swan’s and Moffatt’s own early influences in the British hard-blues music of, in particular, Zeppelin and Free. On the other hand the full-belt adrenalin rush of ‘Parchman Farm’, inspired in equal parts by American blues-rock band Cactus and AC/DC, was written by Moffatt specifically to showcase Swan’s vocal abilities, which he feels have never been truly appreciated. The other original, ‘On the Run’, was inspired by their combined respect and admiration for production and songwriting duo Harry Vanda and the late George Young that offers Moffatt the opportunity to weave acoustic and electric twelve string guitars around Swan’s powerhouse delivery Of the two covers, their take on Hambone Newbern’s Delta blues classic ‘Rollin’ and Tumblin’’ is their most direct nod to Zeppelin, complete with harmonica wizardry courtesy of Trent Williamson’, while ‘Love Is A Drug’ is a pure slice of loping Americana cowritten by Kim Carnes that features backing vocals by fellow Australians Jay O’Shea and Mark Punch. All up, you couldn’t ask for a better introductory showcase to two great Australian artists, still firing decades after they first kicked out their respective jams.

MICHAEL GEORGE SMITH

GARETH KOCK

GHOST STORIES

Foghorn/MGM

Apart from Dane Leonard drumming on three of the nine pieces on this extraordinary collection, the multi-instrumental Koch lives up to that appellation, playing everything else, which means lyres, keyboards, electric, classical acoustic and bass guitars, the yayli tambur (the long-necked Turkish lute) and assorted percussion. And across these nine pieces, described on the cover as a “chiming shimmering cathedral-like vision of ethereal worlds, medieval rock psychedelia (and) monks with guitars, drums & lyres”, Koch musically and quite seamlessly embraces a couple of thousand years of musical history and cultures, from the European classical tradition to contemporary electronic soundscapes as well as Middle Eastern sounds and melodies – something we’ve come to expect from his previous releases as well as some of those in his collaborations with Steve Kilbey – with a solid smattering of ‘60s folk and psych-pop. There are no monks chanting away in the tunes – ‘Old Church’ and ‘Benedictine’ – that might obviously lend themselves to that Gregorian embellishment, but they are gloriously ambient none the less, while ‘Amadeo’ recalls a subdued Rick Wakeman rather than any sort of “rocking” Mozart, so yes, you can add a dash of prog-rock to the subtly heady mix. A dawn chorus of distant birds gently lays the ghosts conjured as ‘She Moves Through The Fair’ closes the album with a comforting sense of the traditional English country fair, timeless.

MICHAEL GEORGE SMITH

MIA DYSON TENDER HEART Independent

The title of Mia Dyson’s new album is much more than a metaphor. In September 2020 she suffered a near death experience and was saved by her husband Karl. The emotional song ‘Thank You’ beautifully captures the feelings of that event and is one of the highlights of what is possibly Dyson’s best album to date. You don’t survive such an experience without being changed in some way. Musically, Dyson is now more reflective – as you might expect – and by her own admission her songs are more subtle. Resident in Los Angeles for nearly a decade, she has her US band in the studio and they bring an appropriate deftness to songs that not only reflect Dyson’s personal experiences but also contain a lot more hooks than previously. Songs such as the title track, ‘Dare’, ‘Ragged Friend,’ ‘Dragging Me Down’ (almost Dylanesque in parts: ‘I hear darkness calling my name’), ‘Sunny Hills’ and ‘Middle Lion’ are all excellent examples of Dyson’s ability to capture and ride a groove. Those half dozen songs right there can become audience favourites. These all create memorable atmospheres while ‘Golden Light’, ‘Come To Me’ and ‘Worship’ see Dyson in ballad mode showing the strength of her voice in this setting.

Dyson is touring here until nearly the end of March. We last saw her here for a brief tour promoting the anniversary of her album Parking Lots, and prior to that with Jen Cloher and Liz Stringer, and her playing gets more impressive every time. If you cannot see her this time, then buy this fine album at miadyson.com.

BRIAN WISE

CLAIRE ANNE TAYLOR

GIVING IT AWAY

Independent

Here is another album born from personal trauma. In this case, Claire Anne Taylor’s son was diagnosed with a rare genetic condition that, by her own admission, ‘turned her world upside down.’ Like Mia Dyson, music became therapeutic for Taylor as she made this, her third album. In fact, their voices are not dissimilar; the expression ‘smoky’ has been used but it might equally be called ‘emotive’. Also, like Dyson, Taylor has been through enough to deliver the messages with beauty and subtlety. The lead off track, ‘Swallowing Stones’ is a great example. ‘I guess I was a fool for thinking we had all the time in the world’ she sings and adds, ‘Sometimes life feels like swallowing stones.’ The album deals with some heavy topics on songs like ‘Dance With Death’ (more upbeat than you might expect) and the glorious title track ‘Giving It Away’ (‘It’s a long lonesome road ahead and I’m not sure I’ll make it through’). It’s hard to actually get through it all without shedding a few tears. But it would be wrong to give the impression that it is gloomy. ‘If You Should See Sunshine’ is a great rocking blues song with Taylor sounding strident over a searing guitar break. ‘Lay Down In The Cold Hard Ground’ delivers some powerful stomping blues of which I am sure Debra Bonham would approve. In fact, Taylor’s voice is fabulously suited for these blues rockers with a great studio band behind her, recorded by Chris Townend (whose credits include Portishead, Silverchair and Tim Finn). A favourite song, ‘Keep On Truckin’’ adds a note of optimism wrapped in a swinging rocker that the Grateful Dead would have turned into an epic! Taylor is touring through to the end of May. You can find her album at claireannetaylor.com

BRIAN WISE

ALBUMS: Blues

BY AL HENSLEY

CHRIS BEARD

PASS IT ON DOWN Blue Heart Records

Son of acclaimed Mississippiborn bluesman Joe Beard, Rochester, New York-based guitarist/singer-songwriter Chris Beard grew up in a blues household around family friends like Buddy Guy and Matt ‘Guitar’ Murphy who taught him the trade at an early age. After a few decades serving his apprenticeship Beard finally released his first album at the age of 40 in 1997. Marking his seventh outing Pass It On Down is Beard’s debut for Blue Heart after releases on roots music labels like JSP and Northern Blues. The set list is a mix of gritty traditional blues and fiery guitar-fuelled modern R&B in the style of Robert Cray. Beard penned eight sides from the funky, horn laden ‘Let The Chips Fall’, ‘When Love Comes Knocking’ and ‘Who Do You Think You’re Foolin’’ to the saucy old-school R&B grooves of ‘Big Girl’, dynamic slow burners like ‘House Of Shame’ and ‘Bitter Baby’, the soulful ballad ‘Keeps Me Believing’ and sentimental title song. While Beard is backed on all these and a Colin Linden/ Gary Nicholson tune by his tightly-knit working band, he travelled to Baton Rouge, Louisiana to record Kenny Neal’s emotive ‘Son I Never Knew’ with the Neal family band.

LAZY

LESTER ALL OVER YOU (25TH ANNIVERSARY EDITION) Antone’s Records/New West Records

Last of the celebrated original Louisiana swamp blues artists of the 1950s/1960s, Leslie Johnson, better known as Lazy Lester, passed away in 2018 aged 85. He was one of the genre’s influential big four that included Slim Harpo, Lightnin’ Slim and Lonesome Sundown, all of whom recorded at J.D.’Jay’ Miller’s Crowley studios in the state’s Southwest. Recorded in 1998 with a house band from Antone’s nightclub in Austin, Texas, this session finds Lester revisiting his classic Excello Records sides. Swamp blues is in the DNA of producer Derek O’Brien who provides linchpin guitar support underscored by stellar contributions from bassist Sarah Brown and drummer Mike Buck. Remastered, resequenced and reissued, All Over You is now available on vinyl for the first time as well as digital download. Miller wrote or co-wrote six of the album’s songs either under his own name or his alias Jerry West. Lester’s grainy voice and laid-back harp distils the essence of Harpo’s ‘I Need Money’ and ‘My Home Is A Prison’, Slim’s ‘You’re Gonna Ruin Me Baby’ and ‘Strange Things Happen’, Jimmy Reed’s ‘The Sun Is Shining’ and Lloyd Price’s ‘Tell Me Pretty Baby’.

MARCEL SMITH FROM MY SOUL Little Village

Soul dynamo Marcel Smith returns to guitarist/producer Kid Andersen’s Greaseland Studios in San Jose, California for this follow up to his 2018 Little Village release Everybody Needs Love. Smith’s seductive, alluring tenor voice channels elements of Sam Cooke, Ben E. King and Aaron Neville as he combines deep soul and R&B imbued with gospel overtones from his church singing background. Playing outstanding guitar Andersen spared no expense in assembling a splendid cast of musicians for the sessions, the core band including pianist Jim Pugh, harmonica ace Rick Estrin, Andy Tarczy on bass, Derrick Martin on drums and Jon Otis on percussion. They’re joined by thumping horns, shimmering strings and glowing back-up vocals, stand-out solos coming from Andersen, Estrin and trombonist Mike Rita. Contributing five of his own songs, Smith covers a wide swath of musical styles on a fistful of others. From Pugh’s ‘To Be True’, O.V. Wright’s ‘There Goes My Used To Be’, Tyrone Davis’ ‘Turn Back The Hands Of Time’ and Mary Wells’ ‘I Don’t Want To Take A Chance’ to the stirring Little Richard shouter ‘Freedom Blues’, Jimmy Liggins’ funky party song ‘Drunk’ and selections from Willie Nelson and the Bee Gees.

RHYTHM KREWE

UNFINISHED BUSINESS Rhombus Records

When it comes to big band blues, US East Coast outfit Roomful Of Blues sets the bar high. The West Coast can now claim one of their own in guitarist/vocalist/ composer Steve Zelman’s ninepiece Rhythm Krewe, potentially destined for wider recognition. Formed in 1990 as Floyd & The Flyboys, it’s puzzling that it took Rhythm Krewe over 30 years to record this, the band’s debut release together. In the meantime, they paid their dues working Southern California nightclubs, festivals, corporate gigs, concert venues, and recording original music for film and TV. Each band member is a first-call musician and many have performed/recorded with a host of star-studded artists from Ray Charles and Etta James to Santana and the Temptations. Rhythm Krewe typifies the time-honoured West Coast blues sound. With Zelman at the helm the band stays close to tradition delivering an intoxicating mix of four-to-the-bar swing, eight-tothe-bar shuffles, blues rumbas, jump blues and Latin-tinged R&B. Hot solos and elaborate horn arrangements punctuate Zelman’s nine originals, Johnny ‘Guitar’ Watson’s ‘She Moves Me’, James Cotton’s ‘She’s Murder’ and Professor Longhair’s ‘Her Mind Is Gone’, the playful closer ‘Monkey Toes’ summoning the spirit of legendary West Coast bandleader Johnny Otis.

ALBUMS: World Music Folk

BY TONY HILLIER

MARA! BIG BAND

ZASHTO

Mara! Music

Sydney’s 13-piece Mara! Big Band lives up to its tall reputation with an epic concept album that focuses on the migrant experience in Australia — as viewed through the prism of female librettists from Bulgaria, Ireland and Iran, and via an adroit amalgam of Eastern European Gypsy brass band and jazz big band traditions. The lastnamed elements feature outstanding horn arrangements and some of the country’s most distinguished instrumentalists, six of which have figured on previous Mara! releases. The songs are performed by a quartet of equally sublime singers that include the ensemble’s founder and codirector, Mara Kiek. Zashto simply demands repeat spins — assuredly the stamp of a great album.

NEWEN AFROBEAT

GRIETAS

Lichen Family

Since its inception in 2009, Chilean big band Newen Afrobeat has established itself as a South American standard-bearer for the universally popular genre that Fela Kuti hatched back in 1960s/70s Nigeria. Grounded in Afrobeat’s compelling rhythm and association with geo-political messaging, their songs advocate indigenous rights, women’s empowerment, multiculturalism and ecological awareness. Indeed, the current 14-piece line-up opens its latest waxing (to be released on March 22) with a title track, delivered by Colombian-Canadian singer Lido Pimienta, related to green matters. Brazilian crooner Chico César guests on a song about life. Elsewhere, the gruff voice of veteran Nigerian-British singer Dele Sosimi, a member of Fela Kuti’s Egypt 80 band in the 1980s, is featured.

OKAVANGO AFRICAN ORCHESTRA MIGRATION

Okavango African Orchestra

On their fourth album in seven years, the Toronto-based Okavango Orchestra — a band of migrants named after the river that flows through Angola, Namibia and Botswana — plays funky uptempo pan-African music on multiple instruments in an impressive range of tunings, timbres and rhythms. The octet already have one JUNO Award (the Canadian equivalent of an ARIA) in the bag and their expertise, exuberance, enterprise and multilingual versatility, which allows them to sing six of the seven songs in a different language (Kassonke, Shona, Kirundi, Tigrinya, Mandingo and Arabic), might well net them another gong, especially given the humanitarian nature of their subject matter.

OKAN

OKANTOMI

Lulaworld

Another magnificent manifestation of Canada’s rich cosmopolitan music society and also a JUNO award-winning band, OKAN is led by a dynamic duo of Cuban female migrants. Violinist Elizabeth Rodriguez and percussionist Magdelys Savigne’s impressive, harmonised singing is highlighted in set standouts ‘Eshu Nigüe’ and ‘Okantomi’. Value adding to their spiritually charged jazz and soul driven Afro-Cuban songs are high calibre expat guests in vocalist Daymé Arocena, pianist Miguel De Armas, guitarist Elmer Ferrer and bassist Roberto Riverón. They help meld sacred Lacumi chants and rhythms into funky modern songs that explore the tensions between love of their homeland and the heartbreak of witnessing Cuba’s ongoing political and economic problems.

MARI BOINE & BUGGE WESSELTOFT AMAME

By Norse Music

Celebrated Sámi/ Norwegian singer Mari Boine consolidates her reputation as an intrepid genre-hopping artist with a meditative duo album that’s different from any other in her back catalogue. Minimalistic and wholly compatible accompaniment from compatriot Bugge Wesseltoft, a jazz pianist, allows Boine’s beautifully soft voice to shine in her native language and in a pristine environment via stories that relate to injustice, struggle, love, vulnerability, pride and dignity. Subtle drum beats here and there enhance rather than detract, especially so in ‘Elle’, a moving joik (roots music) rendition of the theme song from 2008’s The Kautokeino Rebellion , a film based on the Norwegian exploitation of the Sámi culture, and in ‘Mihá’, another song relating to ethnocide.

GAO HONG & IGNACIO LUSARDI MONTEVERDE ALONDRA ARC Music

It might seem an unlikely combination, but a US-based Chinese virtuoso of pipa (pearshaped lute) and a UK-based flamenco guitarist of Argentinian and Italian heritage strike a surprisingly harmonious partnership on a relatively impromptu duo album recorded at London’s legendary Abbey Road Studios. Gao Hong and Ignacio Lusardi Monteverde’s penchant for cross-cultural musical collaboration serves them well as they consummately blend seemingly disparate genres and influences, the latter’s compás (flamenco rhythms) and falsetas (short melodies) providing a solid framework for Hong’s tremelo work and improvised breaks. The symbiosis peaks on pieces inspired by the Andalusian communities of Triana and Ronda.

ANTONIO LIZANA

VISHUDDHA

Cristal Records

Antonio Lizana has claims to being one of Andalusia’s most virtuosic and versatile flamencooriented musicians, not only a saxophonist comparable to Paco de Lucia’s sideman Jorge Pardo but also an impressive high-pitched singer, who grew up in the thrall of the legendary cantaor El Camarón. His articulate fusion of flamenco and jazz captivates throughout Vishudda, with expert assistance from piano fusionier Daniel Garcia and a strong backline.

Improvisation befitting an artist who has worked with the likes of Snarky Puppy, Arturo O’Farrill and Marcus Miller creates a feeling of spontaneity. While Lizana’s songs are deeply rooted melodically and rhythmically in traditional Spanish flamenco, the production and arrangements are patently contemporary. His compositions reflect soundscapes of a childhood in Cádiz, one of the Andalusian capitals of flamenco.

ALBA CARMONA

CANTORA

Concert Music

As a Catalan of Andalusian heritage, Alba Carmona has a wide appreciation of Spanish music and its worldwide influence. On her second solo album since leaving the globetrotting group Las Migas in 2018, this exquisite singer-songwriter pays handsome tribute to her cultural and musical roots and the richness of her country’s oral tradition, primarily backed by her partner-in-rhyme and life, guitarist Jesús Guerrero, and other family members. The cantaora’s songs genuflect to Galicia, Catalan and Sephardic influences and, on a traditional Mexican number. Emotive and evocative singing and a shimmering vibrato ensure that Carmona commands attention from go to whoa.

ALBUMS: Vinyl

BY STEVE BELL

ED KUEPPER

FRONTIERLAND

Prince Melon/Remote Control

First ever vinyl release for Brisbane icon Ed Kuepper’s ARIA-nominated twelfth solo album Frontierland (1996), which dropped in the midst of an incredibly fertile run of mid-‘90s releases. His self-professed “psychedelic pop record” came at a junction when Kuepper had split with his backing band, necessitating him to build the bones himself before beckoning an extensive array of musicians he’d never worked with to provide eclectic embellishments. The analogue recording gives a warm sheen to proceedings, sultry opener ‘All Of These Things’ almost a statement of intent with its traditional structure augmented by beguiling stray sounds in the margins, while jaunty, brass-laden single ‘Fireman Joe’ mines a feel-good UK ‘60s pop vein. ’Weepin’ Willow’ finds Kuepper snarling over a frenetic disco beat and ushers the return of those familiar Stax horns, ‘How Would You Plead?’ enters more sedate, blues-tinged singer-songwriter territory with its subtle drum loops locking into a cruisy groove and ‘M.D.D.P. Limited’ opens with tribal percussion before filling its own ominous universe with off-kilter instrumentation. Near seven-minute side two opener ‘Pushin’ Fear 2’ exudes a light-hearted sense of fun despite its vaguely bleak lyrical imagery, segueing into old-timey string-band frolic ‘Rough Neck Blues’ which sounds like an old gramophone recording and concludes with a lengthy kazoo solo. ’Someone Told Me’ returns to the disco realms, mixing programmed beats with acoustic guitar and brass flourishes, ‘Poor Howard’ closing with more up-tempo dance vibes replete with samples aplenty and horns to bring things home. The wonderfully unorthodox collection features some of the best singing of Kuepper’s career, and further showcases the incredible and enduring depth and breadth of his creativity.

A. SAVAGE SEVERAL SONGS ABOUT FIRE Rough Trade

Usually found out the front of propulsive US indie rockers Parquet Courts, the second album from singer-songwriter Andrew Savage once again showcases his incredible skills as a lyricist. He has the knack of unveiling beauty via sometimes dense tracts of almost streamof-consciousness projection, delving deep into his own insecurities and constantly questioning his own life decisions and worldview, at other times uncannily mining meaning from the mundanity of modern life. His sometimes nearmonotone delivery is still perfectly expressive, often eschewing choruses and following the straight-down-the-line narrative style of Townes Van Zandt, in the process evoking modern day moodists like David Berman or Will Sheff, at other times mirroring the sparkling wit of Jonathan Richman or the oblique wryness of Stephen Malkmus. Savage was recently pushed out of bohemian Brooklyn by gentrification - leaving his adopted hometown for a new life in Paris - and much of the album seems to deal with the ensuing dislocation (‘Elvis In The Amy’, ‘Le Grand Balloon’, ‘My My, My Dear’) and resultant ruminations on the artist’s place in modern society (‘Mountain Time’, ‘Thanksgiving Prayer’). Elsewhere opener ‘Hurtin’ Or Healed’ drips with world-weary resignation, the delightfully oddball ‘Riding Cobbles’ brings some levity to proceedings, ‘David’s Dead’ channels his shock at the passing of a homeless acquaintance, the near-six minute ‘My New Green Coat’ hypnotises with solemnity and gently meandering closer ‘Out Of Focus’ is an impassioned farewell to a loved one. It was recorded in the UK with noted producer John Parish (PJ Harvey, Sparklehorse, Aldous Harding) and features stripped-back accompaniment by Welsh singer-songwriter Cate Le Bon and her band, allowing Savage’s riveting lyrical treatises the focus they so richly deserve.

CAT POWER

SINGS DYLAN: THE 1966 ROYAL ALBERT HALL CONCERT Domino Recording Co

Esteemed US artist Chan Marshall - who releases music under the Cat Power moniker - is no stranger to covering other people’s material, her three-decade canon already including two full covers albums in The Covers Record (2000) and 2022’s Covers (her 2008 record Jukebox predominantly featured covers as well). Now on her twelfth LP she tackles in full Dylan’s famous 1966 ‘Judas’ concert at Manchester Trade Hall (which when incorrectly bootlegged became known as the ‘Royal Albert Hall concert’). Favouring mythology over history, Cat Power addresses that famous oversight by performing her song-by-song recreation of that gig inside Royal Albert Hall itself, her faithful and nuanced renditions showcasing a massive familiarity with and strong connection to the source material. Following Dylan’s blueprint the first half of the 2-LP set is delivered acoustically and it’s fascinating hearing these well-known classics like ‘Visions Of Johanna’, ‘Desolation Row’ and ‘Just Like A Woman’ delivered so authentically through a feminine lens. The first half concludes with a perfectly dreamy take on ‘Mr Tambourine Man’, before the rest of the band enters the fray for the electric portion of the set (which caused so much controversy and consternation at the time). Excellent renditions of tracks like ‘Tell Me, Momma’ and ‘Like A Rolling Stone’ ensue, one fan even getting into the spirit by yelling out ‘Judas’ before ‘Ballad Of A Thin Man’ (although, pedantically, in ’66 it was yelled out after that song finished). It nonetheless adds a nice touch to this fascinating tribute from an accomplished artist to a legendary predecessor, one who’s clearly been a massive influence on her artistic endeavours.

STUART COUPE PRESENTS

8 BALL AITKEN

8 Ball Aitken has toured the world for more than a decade performing his swamp-blues and soul-rock across twenty countries to date. He began this year with a huge Australian tour, followed by USA tour dates.

8 Ball won second place in the 2021 International New Orleans Cigar Box Guitar Festival. His album ‘ICE CREAM MAN’ hit number #1 in the Australian Blues & Roots Charts in the same year, and his follow up ‘ICE CREAM MAN 2’ also hit #1 last June. 8 Ball produced ‘ICE CREAM MAN 2’ himself. The cast of musicians include Grammy winning drummer Tom Hambridge (Buddy Guy), saxophone legend Buddy Leach (George Thorogood & The Destroyers), Sydney soulsinger Taya Chani and 8 Ball’s younger brother Dillion James on Hammond organ and piano. Catch the 8 Ball Aitken Band coming to a venue or festival Australia-wide in 2024. CDS and vinyl records available from 8ballaitken.com

FLOYD THURSBY

Melbourne folk singer-songwriter stalwart Floyd Thursby splits his time between his original tunes and his bands La Mauvaise Réputation (French gypsy jazz) and Skiffle Party (remember skiffle??) His latest single ‘My Constant Companion’ finds him drawing water from the deep well of Irish balladry, with a personal twist. It’s an upbeat song about anxiety, the feeling which gripped so many of us during COVID and which ‘sits on my chest and whispers of all the disasters and terrors that must surely befall me’. The chorus is reworked from the Irish traditional song ‘The Wild Rover’ and its refrain ‘And it’s no, nay, never’. There’s nothing like a rowdy drinking song to help dispel the icy grip of anxiety. The song is from Floyd’s upcoming album ‘Every Day’s Another Dance’, due towards the middle of this year featuring Dan Witton on double bass and harmonies and Harry Lye on vibraphone.

KEVIN SULLIVAN

Kevin Sullivan, multi-talented singer/ songwriter has just released his latest single called ‘Threeways’ from his highly anticipated second album. Residing on the south coast of NSW in Dharawal Country, his new song is about the land of the Warumungu, in the Northern Territory. ‘Threeways’ has a driving beat, like travelling the highway as you do for hours on end in the Outback. This is the title track to the new album that is due for release mid-year 2024 showcasing songs that cross many genres from jazz to blues and country. The new album is a collection of work telling the stories of real people, places and causes that have inspired the singer/songwriter in his music. He has travelled over 170,000 Kms, performing over 270 shows with his family band The Sulli-Vans. Kevin Sullivan is an artist on the rise and one to watch.

CJ COMMERFORD &THE SUPERTONES

CJ Commerford & The Supertones empower love with their charming feel-good love song ‘Bring Me Back To You’. On an ancient upright piano in a family member’s study one night after feeding their beloved golden retriever, Sunny, CJ harnessed the voices of old to bring back a familiar sound that gravitates towards the late 60s soul explosion. The track immediately immerses you in a sophisticated calm and collected layering of vocals, guitar and horn only to drop into that full band swing right when you least expect it. The song was recorded in June 2023 at Melbourne’s best-kept secret, LMC studios, with long-term producer Simon Moro.

‘Bring Me Back to You’ is honest, humble, and heartfelt. An admission to those imperfections in our relationships and how our busy lives make us pine for our lovers. The track finds that balance with realistic romance we can relate to rather than a Hollywood ending that sells movie tickets.

NELSON MATTHEWS

Unthinkable is Nelson Mathews’ audacious debut album. The title track begins with the line “I learnt very early on that those guys with top gun smiles in happy-clappy churches are the ones who’ve got to be most afraid of”. Wry, observational, poignant and funny, these lyrics run the gamut.

On the face of it, his music falls into the alternative category, the type of ‘alternative’ that’s grounded in a strong melodic pop sensibility. The tunes get their hooks in. You keep detecting trace elements of his musical cornerstones - think John Cale, Talking Heads or, closer to home, Ed Kuepper and Hunters & Collectors.

Sonically, the production is bold, with a killer band (featuring vintage keyboards and a brass trio) that help ground and elevate the songs. It was recorded at the iconic Woodstock Studios in Melbourne and mastered by Randy Merrill at Sterling Studios in Nashville.

https://www.nelsonmathews.com

KEEPING NORTH

Think Robert Plant & Alison Krauss meets The Delines with Joe Tex standing in the corner, and you will have some idea about the new music of Keeping North. A hypnotic blend of contemporary folk, country soul and Americana -- but decidedly Australian. The band’s new songs are from the pen of highly regarded writer Steve Tyson, about whom respected music critic Noel Mengel (Courier Mail / Loudmouth) previously had this to say… these are songs that are built to last. And Ian Dearden (Trad & Now) added …a master songwriter.

Featuring the stunning vocals of Jodi Murtha, either upfront or in duet mode with Steve, Keeping North brings together some experienced heads and fresh thinking in a set of new songs that tell other peoples’ stories, little pieces of fiction about Australian characters. The band has just released its first single ‘Broken’, and heads into the studio soon to record their debut album.

www.keepingnorth.com

ALBUMS: Jazz 1

BY DES COWLEY

PHIL SLATER IMMERSION LURE

Independent, CD & digital release

Sydney trumpeter Phil Slater is a musician’s musician. Beloved and admired by his peers, his lowkey demeanour and slim body of recorded work – a mere half-dozen albums issued over twenty years – has resulted in his work largely flying under the radar. But, make no mistake, it is a body of work without peer, devoid of misfires, also-rans. For his earliest recording Strobe Coma Virgo (2003), Slater cited his influences: ‘Peter Sculthorpe, Miles Davis, The Necks, Talk Talk, James Brown, Radiohead, Brian Eno, and lots of 80s and 90s minimalism’. Broad terrain, I know. But, over time, Slater has, if anything, narrowed and winnowed those musical parings, doubling down on his vision: a music grounded in shifting space, densely constructed atmospherics, freefloating trumpet, flexible and organic systems. Any brand-new recording, therefore, is cause for celebration. Immersion Lure, recorded with his outstanding quartet of recent years – saxophonist Matt Keegan, pianist Matt McMahon, bassist Brett Hirst, drummer Simon Barker – serves up five new compositions, all extended pieces, most nudging the ten-minute mark, or more. From its opening notes, it comes across as a moody, introspective outing, full of gentle rhythms and finelylayered patterns. Slater’s trumpet is subdued, shaded, exploratory, as it drifts across McMahon’s unadorned piano, Barker’s delicate percussion. Keegan’s sax is often no more than a whisper, while Hirst’s bass wends a complex path through the mesh of sound. Slater’s music extols a less is more principle, his minimalist approach dedicated to forging dark, ambient textures, spun from space and silence, languorous journeys, seductive and beguiling.

ASTEROID EKOSYSTEM

ASTEROID EKOSYSTEM LIVE Alister Spence Music ASM014, vinyl & digital release

The Alister Spence Trio – comprising pianist Spence, bassist Lloyd Swanton, and drummer Toby Hall – has been an on-going concern for over a quarter-century. While their music has affinities with The Necks (they share a bass player, after all), in the main they steer clear of The Necks consciously repetitive figures, leaning more toward an omnivorous approach, open to wide-ranging improvisational models, not to mention occasional dance-floor grooves. In 2019, the Trio joined forces with guitarist Ed Kuepper, recording a sprawling double-album – over 100-minutes of music – under the name Asteroid Ekosystem. While – for me at least – this was an unexpected pairing, perhaps it shouldn’t have been. Spence has played in various iterations of the Laughing Clowns; while Ed, best-known for his songcraft, has demonstrated plenty of improvisational chops to match his adventurous spirit. Certainly, an abundance of that can be heard here, on Asteroid Ekosystem’s second release, recorded live at the Great Club in Sydney. In many ways, it’s a different beast to AE’s debut, this one displaying a greater emphasis on soundscapes. Ed’s rhythmic guitar – of the trance-inducing kind, think John Cale and Tony Conrad – is seamlessly integrated with Spence’s piano, Swanton’s roiling bass and Hall’s sparse percussion. Over 45-minutes, this quartet produce sonic dreamscapes, manufactured from gentle hooks and unwavering thrumming. Nowhere is this more evident than on ‘Out Upon Circumference’, tenminutes of Ed’s hypnotic, near Middleeastern inflections, to which Spence adds pointillistic, flourishing touches. This is where improv meets drone, a master-class meted out by these tireless and restless sonic explorers.

KRISTIN BERARDI

MONASH SESSIONS

Monash University, digital release

Monash University’s Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music and Performance is to be commended for its on-going series of jazz releases, pairing students with a host of leading composers and players. The Monash Sessions series kicked off in 2013, with legendary Brazilian musician Hermeto Pascoal, and firebrand New York saxophonist George Garzone. Since then, the ‘Sessions’ series has grown to embrace Italian trumpeter Enrico Rava, American pianist Kenny Werner, Tony Gould and Mike Nock. Originally issued on the Jazzhead label, Monash more recently took over the reins, issuing a new cycle of albums from 2020 onwards, featuring Judy Bailey, Linda May Han Oh, Sandy Evans, Andrea Keller, and others. The latest three albums in the series – all digital releases, modestly-priced – present the music of Kristin Berardi, Canadian trumpeter Ingrid Jensen, and US drummer John Hollenbeck. Berardi’s outing comprises ten songs, arranged and performed by four different ensembles, including a striking acapella group. It reinforces – should we even need it – her incredible interpretive prowess, her ravishing and captivating voice, and her compositional mastery. Standouts include the beautiful opener ‘Don’t Say Maybe’, with it’s Joni Mitchelllike dreamy cadences, elevated by Tobias Botrell’s trumpet; a gorgeous acapella rendition of ‘More Than We Need’, stripped to its bones; the Sam Anning-penned ‘Sweethearts’, a breezy, summer-drenched classic; and the eight-minute ‘Tree Song’, which emanates a flickering, latenight groove. Make no mistake, there is nothing student-y about this recording, it is a sublime album from start to finish, celebrating the music and talents of one of our finest voices.

JORDAN TARENTO

LATTICES

Earshift Music EAR088, CD & digital release

Bassist Jordan Tarento is name new to me, but the make-up of his band – guitarists Harry Tinney and Hugh Stuckey, pianist Darren Archer, drummer Darryn Farrugia, and marimba/glockenspielist Zela Papageorgiou – certainly piqued my interest. The album is an all-original affair, featuring eight compositions by the leader, all crafted during Melbourne’s lockdowns of 2020-21. With a title drawn from a crosshatching motif, Tarento defines this music as reflecting ‘a textural orchestration approach in which interlocking ostinatos combine to form dense Lattices.’ In this, he has been inspired by the soaring melodies of the Pat Metheny Group, as well as mavericks like Icelandic bassist Skúli Sverisson, and Swiss pianist Nik Bärtsch. Certainly, the opener ‘From the Rooftops’ imparts something of the clean, gentle lines heard on Metheney’s recordings with Lyle Mays, the twin guitars of Tinney and Stuckey conjuring wide-open spaces, clear skies. But what stands out is the beautiful way in which guitars, piano, marimba, and drums interlock to form a percussive dance, unfurling intricate patterns, joyous overlays. There is a light, percussive weightlessness to this music, a buoyancy easy on the ear. The brief ‘Skeleton Key’ flirts with Steve Reich’s pulse-driven music; while Archer’s Latin-sounding piano on ‘Chrysalis’ revels in low-key funkiness. Credit goes to Tinney and Stuckey, whose densely-woven, intertwined-flurries, light as air, gently motor this music, lending it a polished, effortless veneer. But, most of all, Lattice is testament to Tarento’s clear-eyed vision, demonstrating his compositional aptitude for harnessing a complex musical palette, and giving it licence to dance, cavort, and sing.

By Des Cowley

Started Out Just Drinking Beer: The Mental as Anything Story

By Stuart Lloyd (Puncher & Wattmann, p/b)

Confession: I never really followed the Mental’s music back in the day, though of course I knew a bunch of their songs. They were just in the ether, like so much memorable pop. For me, Reg Mombassa was first and foremost an artist, his iconic imagery appearing on Mambo tee-shirts. I even own one of his prints, won in a raffle. But my curiosity was aroused when, a few weeks back, a bookseller friend, operating out of Berkeley, issued a catalogue of the library of Cameron Allan, an Australian-born, but American based composer, who died in Memphis, Tennessee, back in 2013. Amongst his many credits, Allan co-founded, with Martin Fabinyi, Regular Records in 1978, ostensibly to finance a film (never made) with the tantalising title Lipstick Killers. The label’s first signing was Mental as Anything. Allan produced the band’s EP, Mental as Anything Plays at Your Party, which contained the break-out hit ‘The Nips are Getting Bigger’ (a song the Mentals were still playing fortyyears later), as well as the band’s first two albums, Get Wet and Expresso Bongo. He’d go on to produce albums by Flowers, The Sports and Broderick Smith, before moving to Los Angeles in the late eighties, where he composed scores for film and TV. Allan’s library was chock-a-block with avant-garde material: writings by John Cage, Morton Felman, Harry Partch, Cornelius Cardew, Pierre Boulez, Marcel Duchamp, alongside impeccable literary titles by Calvino, Borges, Beckett. How in the hell, I wondered, did Allan’s affinity for experimental music intersect with the Mental’s pop-driven melodies. As fate would have it, Stuart Lloyd’s new book on Mental as Anything had just hit the bookshops. I went

It turns out the truth was a far simpler affair than my imagination led me to believe. While Cameron Allan did a great job with the Mental’s debut EP, and a decent job with Get Wet, there’s a belief he came up short with Expresso Bongo, an album described by Mental’s manager Jeremy Fabinyi (Martin’s brother) as an “Absolute disappointment. That production was appalling.” Exit Cameron.

The Mentals were always more than worka-day rock n’ rollers. The earliest iteration of the band met at the National Art School in Sydney in 1975, and their art-school credentials were reflected on albums covers and posters, which could be described as Andy Warhol screenprint meets New Wave aesthetic. Increasingly, though, Reg Mombassa’s art took centre-stage, delivering a recognisable brand that few bands of the period possessed. The Mentals even took to making surrealist videos, on a shoe-string, well ahead of the MTV era.

The band was blessed with four song-writers and two singers (three, if you count Reg, though singing was never his strong suit). It put them a cut above most bands, furnishing a depth to their albums that saw the first half-dozen or so – including Cats and Dogs, acclaimed by singer Martin Plaza as their masterpiece – certified gold or platinum. But more than anything, this was a hard-working band, and Lloyd’s account documents in grinding detail just how hard that was, criss-crossing the country in a Kombi, coastto-coast; ditto Britain, Europe, America, Canada, Japan, year-in, year-out. Lloyd estimates the band played 6,450 gigs all-up.

There’s nothing overly glamorous about it, but you’ve got to admire their stamina all the same. As success blossomed, the team of roadies, booking agents, tour managers, wives and girlfriends steadily grew, as did the overheads. The band graduated to bigger vehicles – trucks, buses – but essentially it was more of the same.

While music took centre-stage, art was never far behind. When on tour, the band constantly sketched, and were just as likely to be found at the Tate in London, or the Prado in Madrid, as a local bar. As early as 1982, the Mentals had their first group exhibition at Watters Gallery in Sydney, at which both Patrick White and Elton John bought pieces. But booze – along with inevitable hangovers – was never far away, courtesy of generous riders. Over time, it took its toll. Martin drank to quell pre-gig nerves; the others just drank because – like Everest – it was there.

One of the difficulties breaking into the US was that critics never quite knew what to make of the band, invariably reaching for ill-matched comparisons, like Lovin’ Spoonful, Squeeze, Nick Lowe and Rockpile. The Mental’s quirky humour often went way over heads. There were lost opportunities. The Mentals were part of the high-profile Australian Made roadshow in 1986-87, along with The Saints, The Divinyls, I’m Talking, The Models, The Triffids, INXS; but found themselves omitted from Richard Linklater’s film of the tour, due to a copyright dispute. But, on the plus side, there were sudden windfalls, like when ‘Live it Up’ raced to the #2 spot in the UK, courtesy of being featured in Crocodile Dundee.

Considering the sheer grind, it’s hard to believe the classic line-up lasted as long as it did. By 1999, exhaustion had set in. Reg and Pete O’Doherty left; a few years on David Twohill (aka Bird) was sacked (leading to a bitterly played out wrongful dismissal claim filed in the courts); Martin Plaza succumbed to ill-health; until finally it was just Greedy Smith, who soldiered on, with a rotating cast, playing to ever-diminishing crowds, right up until his tragic death in 2019.

Lloyd’s account draws heavily on those involved – almost to the point of being an oral history. While occasional yarns feel like they’re laid on with a trowel (cue drumroll), it is fair to say that Lloyd has written the definitive account of Mental as Anything’s forty-year plus career. His book takes us into the studio, on the road, chronicling the successes and gaffs of a likeable bunch of larrikins, who never took themselves too seriously, but between them produced a much-loved body of music, still with us today.

Rhythms Books Too

Everyone has a book in them is a much touted and repeated cliché. It’s sorta true I suppose and certainly over the recent years just about everyone involved in any way with the music caper (both on, off and side of stage) has heeded the call and started hammering out their memoirs.

Some are – of course – more interesting than others. As you’d imagine the ability to string a sentence, let alone a paragraph and let’s not talk about 100,000 or so words, varies from individual to individual. Often people telling their life stories don’t realise how important a good editor is. Many don’t realise that you don’t need to be at the centre of every story for it to be interesting – and that’s it’s the insights that often tell more than the personal proximity to iconic stars.

In fact, many of the finest memoirs – particularly in the case of nonmusicians - have been written by people who haven’t been that closely involved with superstars. And some of the best memoirs from musicians have come from ‘I coulda been a contender but it didn’t happen’ figures. I’ll often select a book by someone who didn’t become a household name over one by someone who is.

Peter Jesperson (disclosure here – I consider Peter a very good friend) has worked with one of the greatest cult bands of all time in The Replacements. He’s also been a DJ, a record company person, manager, tour manager, archivist, record shop staffer, a record producer (including working with Australia’s Halfway) and a whole bunch of other things. Most of all he’s always been and continues to be a music fan. That’s driven absolutely everything he’d done in both his life and career.

That sense of music fandom – let’s call if geekdom (with affection) –pours out of every sentence in Euphoric Recall: A Half Century as a Music Fan, Producer, DJ, Record Executive and Tastemaker which was published towards the end of last year. It has a Foreword from fellow music geek David Fricke.

This is a book about a music obsessive (thank the Beatles) who had that wonderful combination of talent, the desire to work hard, good fortune and being in the right place at the right time.

Jesperson is best known for being one of the founders of Minneapolis independent record label Twin/Tone Records who released more than 300 records. Then as part of that caper he stumbled across a band called The Replacements and they changed his life.

I must at this point say that reading Euphoric Recall I felt like Jesperson and I have lived such similar lives in different continents. Substitute Twin/Tone for GREEN or Laughing Outlaw, and the Replacements for the Hoodoo Gurus or Paul Kelly. I could go on. I guess music fans tend to gravitate into the orbit of each other, particularly if your music addiction has been going as long as it has for each of us.

Jesperson writes like a fan. He’s chatty, friendly, unpretentious, and upbeat. On the occasions where he could settle a few scores involving people and events he treads carefully and with compassion and empathy.

This is a wonderful book on so many levels. Search it out – and don’t worry if you never quite got The Replacements – that’s not really what this book is about (and you couldn’t substitute the name of dozens of bands and still get a lot from those sections). This is a story of where a love of music can take you and why the true believers never lose that passion.

Speaking of fandom, one of the most endearing books I’ve read on the subject was recently published independently. Wendy’s Smith’s book The Quiet Ones: Skyhooks, AC/DC and Me is a heartfelt, passionate and just delightful look at the author and a group of her friends and their complete immersion/obsession with the aforementioned bands in Melbourne in the mid 1970s.

By Stuart Coupe

The group was dubbed The Quiet Ones by Shirley Strachan. Smith and her buddies were just there – as often a possible – around these two bands and others such as Sherbet during the early days of their careers, and as such the author tells a remarkable story about what it was like being a participant in the dance/town hall/disco scene in the era as these bands made their way to the not-at-the-time inevitable stardom.

As much as that it’s about being a teenage music fan – in fact it’s about just being a teenager in Melbourne in this era. The background of suburban life, school, getting to and from gigs, relationships with parents, early infatuations, meeting the bands and engaging with them is so freshly and conversationally told.

I loved every page of it and chances are you will too. Get it here: https://thequietonesbook.com

STUART COUPE PRESENTS

THIS WAY NORTH

Dynamic indie-pop-rock two-piece band from Australia full of rapturous nostalgia, This Way North’s music takes you from moody, tremolotinged heart-tuggers to pounding driving alt-psych rock through a sonic landscape of reverb-soaked guitars and rolling rhythms. With odes to 90’s rock sitting on air-tight grooves and full, cinematic spaciousness, their music is a portal to summer festivals. This critically-acclaimed duo released their longawaited debut album Punching Underwater on February 8th, 2024. Co-produced by awardwinning artist Ainslie Wills and esteemed engineer and producer Jono Steer, the album is a brilliant example of spirit, verve, rich melodies and musicality combining to form a fascinating hybrid of indie rock, bluesy Americana and funky folk-rock and pop. You can hear the echoes of Warpaint, Mia Dyson, Ruby Boots, Jen Cloher, Margaret Glaspy, St Vincent and more running through the album’s nine songs.

COREY LEGGE

‘West Coast’ is the second single from Corey Legge’s forthcoming 4th studio album and is sure to become an instant fan favourite. Recorded with producer Nash Chambers and co-produced by Syd Green, this country-pop track is ‘summer on repeat’, taking the listener back to simpler, easier times. Corey’s classy guitar licks are on full display, with smooth vocal melodies and laidback grooves setting the scene for a track that is best listened to whilst driving down the highway as the sun sets slowly over the ocean. In January 2024 Corey was announced as the Australian Country Music People’s Choice Award winner for ‘Most Popular Musician or Instrumentalist’ at Tamworth Country Music Festival. Corey will be releasing his 4th album later in 2024, with a number of shows across Europe and Australia to be announced soon.

For upcoming shows, CDs and merchandise visit www.coreylegge.com

DILLION JAMES

Dillion James specialises in starting the party with his New Orleans piano grooves, funky Hammond Organ, and raw honest vocals. The full-length album ‘HEAVY KEYS’ was co-produced with his string shredding older brother 8 Ball Aitken, who also co-wrote four of the tracks. It features Melbourne drumming legend John Watson behind the kit and Mississippi based saxophone legend ‘Buddy Leach’ (long-time member of George Thorogood & The Destroyers) who played the majority of the sax on the recording. A handpicked cast of Brisbane’s finest blues musicians also played on the album.

Over the last twenty years of gigging on the festival and blues circuit, Dillion has re-birthed an energetic sound that encapsulates the tone of an earlier era. His self-taught keyboard technique binds melody and rhythm together, and like a real blues-man, has paid his dues performing and perfecting his craft on the road and at the late night gigs www.dillionjames.com

RATTLINCANE

Weaving earthy melodies with honest stories from the fields of their lives ‘Gone’ is the latest album from Rattlincane. Born and bred in the Northern Suburbs of Melbourne these rugged souls have crafted a musical tapestry that defies genres delivering a familiar yet fresh and captivating sound. Rattlincane’s music is unapologetically raw and profoundly genuine. Recorded at Audrey studios in Coburg with Craig Pilkington of Killjoys fame, this album is a major step up in the evolution of this band. From simple songs to epic tales ‘Gone’ is a 14-chapter story book. If you have never heard Rattlincane’s music before then now is a special time for you as well as us. Check out our compilation album ‘Here We Are’ and the first two singles from ‘GONE’ on all the usual streaming platforms. 3 full albums available on Bandcamp.rattlincane.com F/book: Rattlincane Australia/You Tube: Rattlincane

TORIA RICHINGS

2023 proved to be a great year for Toria Richings. She certainly has made her mark on the Americana scene. With several trips to Nashville including playing showcases at the Americanafest, Toria also recorded a new EP with the same band as her previous release, The Nashville sessions. These musicians played with the greats Elvis Johnny Cash, Dolly Parton even recently Taylor swift!! 2024 will be just as busy, her new EP Cowboys and Moonshine is due for release May/June 2024, Toria is also heading to play showcases at the Folk Alliance in Kansas City and embarking on her first UK tour in June, check out Toria’s Music on all streaming apps, or go to her website to go old school and buy a cd! toriarichings.com / instagram.com/toriarichings / tiktok.com/@toriarichings / linktr.ee/ToriaRichings

TRASH SPRINGFIELD

After delighting us w/ her ‘Early Signs’ EP, Sydney’s Trash Springfield returns w/ her maiden album, ‘Escape From Those Who Care.’ Trash’s range is really on show here w/ solemn confessionals adjacent to funky party songs and brooding ballads riding shotgun w/ chugging rock. The familiar strains of ‘Control’ begin proceedings followed by the blazing groove of ‘Rip Off’ and the ambitious ‘Everythings Alright.’ Familiar to independent radio listeners will be the laid-back rock of ‘Confused by Early Signs,’ followed by songs covering diverse themes, ranging from confidence to diffidence and boastfulness to hopelessness. 10th track ‘Standing Around’ closes out the album. Starting w/ a lone piano, it soon evolves into a bemused ballad w/ searing strings and a desperate, impassioned vocal delivery. A very mature and impressive album from a woman of 23, “Escape From Those Who Care,’ seems destined for plenty of airplay and attention over the summer

MARCH

March 5-13

Brunswick Music Festival Brunswick VIC

March 8-11, 2024

Womadelaide Adelaide, SA

March 8-11, 2024

Port Fairy Folk Festival Port Fairy, VIC

March 22 – March 24

Yackandandah Folk Festival, VIC

March 26-28

Moruya Blues & Roots Festival Moruya, NSW

March 28 – April 1

National Folk Festival Canberra, ACT

Thursday March 28Monday April 1 Bluesfest Tyagarah, NSW

APRIL

April 5 – April 7

Fairbridge Festival, WA

April 12 – April 14

Moruya Blues & Roots Festival

April 24 – May 5

New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival New Orleans, Louisiana

MAY

May 16-19

Blues On Broadbeach Broadbeach, QLD

JUNE

June 6 – June 9

Townsville Folk Festival, QLD

June 7 – June 9

Castlemaine Jazz Festival, VIC

June 7 – June 10

National Celtic Festival, Port Arlington, VIC

COMPILED BY SUE BARRETT

(Mundy-Turner, Sister Moon Ensemble); Jay Turner (Mundy-Turner); Cathy Nixon (Brunswick Women’s Choir); Nuala Williams (Gondwana Choirs); Heather Croall (Adelaide Fringe); Chris Murphy (INXS, Murphy Rights Management, rooArt Record Label); and Milly Petriella (APRA / AMCOS).

Melbourne-based performer Canisha has launched her EP, Don’t Be Scared, and on Sunday 19 May 2024 is performing with Bart Willoughby (of No Fixed Address) at Darebin Arts Centre in Melbourne. www.canisha. com.au https://arts.darebin.vic.gov.au/whatson

Australian musician Denny Burgess, Chairman of the Australian Songwriters Association and bassist with The Throb, The Whispers, Masters Apprentices, Ginger, George Hatcher Band, His Majesty, Good Time Charlie, BurgessBurgess and Dead Singer Band, received a Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) in the Australia Day 2024 Honours List for service to the performing arts, and to the music industry.

Other Australia Day 2024 Honours List recipients for service to music and/or the performing arts included: Cath Mundy

…AND

Saxophonist Mars Williams (68), of The Waitresses and The Psychedelic Furs. died Illinois, USA (Nov)

Shane MacGowan (65), of The Pogues, died in November

Killing Joke guitarist Geordie Walker (64), died Czech Republic (Nov)

Colin Burgess (“forever young”), a man of fashion, a lover of home baked biscuits and Australian drummer for The Haze, Masters Apprentices, AC/DC, His Majesty, Good Time Charlie, BurgessBurgess and Dead Singer Band, died NSW, Australia (Dec)

Dixie Chicks co-founder Laura Lynch (65), died Texas, USA (Dec)

Bob Johnson (79), guitarist and songwriter with British folk/rock band Steeleye Span, died in December

New Zealand singer/songwriter Kerryn Fields has a new live EP, The Folk Singer. Kerryn says, “Following on from my song ‘Queenie’ (Water, 2021) these five acoustic tracks dive deeper into the story, walking the journey of creation, climate change and chronic illness.” Multi-instrumentalist, singer, composer and performer Josh Bennett teaches music online and has some useful videos on his YouTube channel. www.joshbennett.com.au www.youtube.com/@joshbennettmusic

Australian singer/songwriter Mark Wilkinson’s Golden Afternoons Tour 2024 kicks off at the Stranded Bar in Brisbane in early April. www.markwilkinsonmusic.com

COVID-19 is still around. And the flu season is coming. You might like to re-visit the wise words of the Ali Curung community. And to remember that airborne diseases (e.g. COVID-19) behave like smoke and hang

British drummer Russell Hunter (76), of The Deviants and Pink Fairies, died England (Dec)

Tom Smothers (86), American comedian, actor and musician, who performed on John Lennon’s 1969 recording of ‘Give Peace a Chance’, died California, USA (Dec)

English guitarist and singer Denny Laine (79), of The Moody Blues, Air Force and Wings, died Florida, USA (Dec)

Essra Mohawk (75), American singer/ songwriter, died Tennessee, USA (Dec)

American keyboardist Joseph “Amp” Fiddler (65), of Funkadelic / Parliament, died Michigan, USA (Dec)

Jeffrey Foskett (67), singer and songwriter with The Beach Boys, died in December English guitarist Ronnie Caryl (70), died France (Dec)

Les McCann (88), American jazz pianist and singer, died California, USA (Dec)

Canadian singer and guitarist Myles Goodwyn (75), of April Wine, died Canada (Dec)

Melanie Safka (76), who wrote ‘Brand New Key’, ‘Lay Down (Candles in the Wind)’, ‘Look What They’ve Done to My Song, Ma’ and

around – so if the toilets at the gig or the music festival are poorly ventilated, pop on a mask while you do your business. www. youtube.com/watch?v=_fsx7paa9_Y

Arts Hub has a list of 2024 Australian film festivals. Tickets to some films have already sold out. And some festivals have an online / on demand option. www.artshub.com. au/news/features/australian-film-festivalsguide-2024-2606474

New music releases include: Nick Justice, Stranger in my Town; Northern Resonance, Vision of Three; The Black Keys, Ohio Players; Nathalie Joachim, Ki moun ou ye; John Devlin, Next in Line; Kim Gordon, The Collective; Ambrose Akinmusire, Owl Song; Martyn Joseph, This is What I Want to Say; Ariana Grande, Eternal Sunshine; Kate Rusby, Light Years; Rod Stewart with Jools Holland, Swing Fever; Peter Garrett, The True North; Lauren Collier, Uddevalla; Mark Knopfler, One Deep River; Sheryl Crow, Evolution; Adam Holmes, The Voice of Scotland; Brown Horse, Reservoir; The Jesus And Mary Chain, Glasgow Eyes; Missy Higgins, The Sound of White (20th anniversary edition)

turned A A Milne’s poem ‘Forgiven’ into the song ‘Alexander Beetle’, died in January Australian conductor, pianist and music theatre director Kellie Dickerson (53), died NSW, Australia (Jan)

Tony Clarkin (77), guitarist with English band Magnum (who has just released its 23rd studio album, Here Comes the Rain), died in January Scorpions and Kingdom Come drummer James Kottak (61), died Kentucky, USA (Jan)

Mary Weiss (75), singer with American group The Shangri-Las, died California, USA (Jan)

Songwriter and rockabilly guitarist Larry Collins (79), co-writer of ‘Delta Dawn’ and ‘You’re the Reason God Made Oklahoma’, died California, USA (Jan)

Neil Kulkarni (51), British music critic (Melody Maker, Chart Music), died in January Australian composer David Lumsdaine (92), died England (Jan)

Annie Nightingale (83), BBC Radio 1’s first female presenter and a presenter of The Old Grey Whistle Test, died England (Jan)

Record company executive Mike Taylor, of Epic Records, Sony Music, Universal Music Australia and Island Records Australasia, died New York, USA (Jan)

Mark Wilkinson Canisha

Mundy-Turner

Kerryn Fields

Melanie Shane Macgowan

The ultimate career-spanning Eagles collection combining the band’s greatest hits with beloved album tracks and classic live performances!

-AVAILABLE APRIL 12 -

Available as a 3 CD set, a deluxe 6 LP set on 180-gram vinyl. Also available on all streaming services.

*A limited edition, embossed lithograph will be available as a gift with purchase, while stocks last.