5 Songs Friday November 15, 2024
Digging deep into the crates for some of these
Stevie Wonder – “Session Number 112” 1962 from The Jazz Soul of Little Stevie. He was 12 years old and this was his debut album. It’s not one I’ve ever heard before, nor is it one that most people know. For one thing, there are no vocals here. This track is a nice little jazz number based on that chord progression we all know from “Stray Cat Strut” but which is in dozens of other songs dating back at least to a Duke Ellington number I can’t remember right now. Our pre-teen genius plays piano on the first half of the tune, then delivers a plaintive, yearning harmonica solo that takes up the last half of the record. I say plaintive, but it’s also playful, especially near the end when the postpones the conclusion with a series of wild codas eliciting a dum-dum-dada-dum dum response from the band before the fade.
Maura O’Connell – “The Water Is Wide” 1989 from Just In Time. This album knocked me on my ass when I first heard it back in 1989. After finally starting to understand Irish traditional music with the classic Van Morrison & the Chieftains album, the next step in my education was this record from, as I would learn soon enough, the one-time singer of De Dannan. Of course, O’Connell wasn’t strictly a traditional singer at this point – this record was produced by then newgrasser Bela Fleck. But there are plenty of old folk songs here. This one is actually English, but you can’t miss O’Connell’s accent, and the theme of the contrast between early love and fading love works for almost any culture. O’Connell sings this acapella with a haunting not-quite harmony voice on the last couple verses. She has one of my favorite voices in all of music, though she has, to my knowledge, never made a record that fulfilled the promise of this one.
Ben Harper – “Where Did We Go Wrong” 2002 from Bloodline Maintenance. Listening to this fine little cut from Mr. Harper makes me wanna holler this is very similar to Marvin Gaye’s “Inner City Blues.” The groove is less supple but not that far away, the bare bones melody follows virtually the same pattern, and the theme might be couched in a more difficult metaphor but isn’t all that far from just crying out loud about the state of the world. And damned if lyrics like “With new marching orders / To find someone else to blame / They stormed the castle / But the king turned out to be a pawn” don’t resonate with events in recent years. I generally like this guy, though he rarely comes to mind when I’m thinking of things to play. I’m glad I revisited this one, though.
Sweet Honey in the Rock – “Run” 1998 from 25. I saw Sweet Honey in the Rock something like 17 times in the 80s and 90s – these were among the very best live performances I ever saw in my life. I think all but one of those times the group consisted of the five women on this record – Bernice Johnson Reagon, Ysaye Maria Barnwell, Carol Maillard, Aisha Kahlil, and the composer and lead voice on this track, Nitanju Bolade Casel. I can’t imagine how horrible it must be to be a person on the receiving end of an abusive relationship, but Casel could, and even better, she sings of escaping from such an experience. Backed by the incomparable ensemble of voices – two serving as harmonic baseline, two others singing a melody – Casel captures the sense of urgency, of desire to achieve safety, of finally being able to breathe freely inherent in a woman who has decided to break away from her abuser. Of course, with Sweet Honey, this specific situation also has in the background the desire to escape from slavery, from civil rights abuses, from all manner of oppression. And, as they so often did, by encouraging connection to those who would help the abused woman, Sweet Honey celebrate community even as they acknowledge that some people side with convention. The swirl of voices, the soaring sounds of Casel, and even the rare sound of conga (I think) drums under this normally acapella ensemble is downright intoxicating.
Ducks Deluxe – “Dig It Deep” 2013 fromRockin’ At the Moon.“I don’t want to hear no boogie woogie on the way to hell.” That’s the sentiment in the catchiest line of this simmering blast of pub rock from this seminal band’s 40thAnniversary tour in 2012. Back when I first started learning about the New Wave and punk rock world in the late 70s, the pub rock bands seemed like legends to me because there was simply no way to find any of their records. Ducks Deluxe included members of Graham Parker & the Rumour, the Motors, and Tyla Gang, all late 70s groups I loved. When they got back together in 2007, the line-up as ever was shifting, but primary songwriter Sean Tyla and original guitarist Martin Belmont were staples – by this recording, Brinsley Schwarz (who had played on the last Ducks Deluxe original tour before he and Belmont left to join Graham Parker) had rejoined. This is a cool little song, nothing earth-shattering, but the kind of thing that is always going to sound great to me. It’s a rock’n’roll number played by guys who have devoted their lives to the music.