Tag: Grateful Dead

Review: Los Lobos

by thedailyrecord, posted in Kansas City Star, review

(Above: Los Lobos merge an original with a Neil Young classic on the steps of the Liberty Memorial in Kansas City, Mo. on September, 17, 2004.)

By Joel Francis
The Kansas City Star 

Los Lobos made one point abundantly clear during their opening number, a nearly 10-minute romp through “The Neighborhood”: these boys came to play. One of the most versatile, dynamic and enduring bands going outdid themselves Friday night in front of a sold-out crowd at Knuckleheads. The set was a potent mix of old favorites, new tracks, covers and a mini-set of classic Spanish material in the vein of the band’s “La Pisotla y el Corazon” EP.

Louie Perez, Cesar Rosas and David Hidalgo formed a triple-guitar threat across the front of the stage, but no one seemed to be having more fun than bass player Conrad Lozano, who performed with a perpetual grin throughout the night.Great weather contributed to the celebratory atmosphere. Slightly less than 1,000 fans packed Knucklehead’s patio and spilled into the road, which had been blocked off in front of the venue. “I Walk Alone,” “Main Street” and “Chuco’s Cumbia” were early high points of a set that stretched more than two hours – a half-hour longer than the 90-minute sets the group has typically delivered in previous Kansas City tour stops.

Hidalgo hopped behind the drums during “Don’t Worry Baby” but returned to his guitar for a rousing tribute to Buddy Holly. The Bo Diddley beat of “Not Fade Away” had nearly died when Hidlago resurrected the groove with a reading of “Bertha” that sounded more like the Allman Bros. Band than the Grateful Dead. The players finally shed their instruments, but quickly returned with two new musicians in tow – Juan-Carlos Chaurand and Enrique Chi from the local opening band Making Movies.

The headliners were more than hospitable during the 25-minute encore, giving both Chaurand and Chi several lengthy solos and letting them trade licks (and more than hold their own) with their heroes. The pair was ready to politely secede the stage after each number, only to have Hidalgo motion to stick around for a little more fun.

Everyone had nearly left the stage when Hidalgo kept stubbornly strumming, hinting at the opening lick of “La Bamba” and sending everyone scurrying back to their instruments. When Perez rolled into “Good Lovin’” a stream of female dancers filled the stage and the crowd carried the vocals, obscuring the boundaries between performers and audience. The medley reached a natural endpoint several times, but the band kept playing, trading solos and smiles.

Setlist: The Neighborhood; Yo Canto; On Main Street; I Walk Alone; Emily; Come On, Let’s Go; Chuco’s Cumbia; Burn It Down; Tin Can Trust; Shakin’ Shakin’ Shakes; Chains Of Love; Let’s Say Goodnight; Ay Te Dejo enSan Antonio; Volver, Volver; She’s About a Mover (with David Hidalgo on drums); Don’t Worry Baby; Not Fade Away > Bertha. Encore (with Enrique Chi and Juan-Carlos Chaurand from Making Movies): Cumbia Raza; Mas y Mas; La Bamba > Good Lovin’ > La Bamba.

Keep reading:

Review: Los Lobos (2008)

Review: Alejandro Escovedo

Buckwheat Brings It Back Home

Advertisement

Cracker: The Grateful Dead of indie rock

by thedailyrecord, posted in band feature, Industry commentary

(Above: Cracker perform “Take Me Down to the Infirmary” at Crossroads in Kansas City on July 6, 2007.)

By Joel Francis
The Daily Record

As the 1980s morphed into the 1990s, David Lowery was riding high. The underground band he started in 1983 had attained major label success, and his new band, Cracker, continued to ride that wave. His songs “Low” and “Teen Angst (What the World Needs Now)” were all over the radio and MTV.

This year, Lowery and guitarist Johnny Hickman celebrate the 20th anniversary of the band they founded together out of the ashes of Camper Van Beethoven. In that time, Cracker has come full circle, operating in a landscape that eerily mirrors the early days of Camper Van Beethoven.

“To me the real story isn’t that we had bit MTV and radio hits in the early ‘90s,” Lowery said, “but how the band kept going after that for 15 years. We’ve done it by cultivating a loyal following that exists away from the rest of the industry.”

Cracker’s model of relentless touring, taper- and fan-friendly policies and annual weekend destination festival should be instantly recognizable to any jam band fans.

“We all got it from the same place,” Lowery said. “I remember back in Camper (Van Beethoven) days telling people we had more in common with the (Grateful) Dead than the punk scene. Out of all the jam bands, I don’t know how many played with the Dead, but we did.”

David Lowery (second from left) and Cracker perform a free concert tonight on the KC Live! stage in the Power and Light District. Start time is listed as 8 p.m., but bands usually go on much later.

The Dead invited Cracker to open for them in 1994 at their annual stand at Autzen Stadium in Eugene, Ore. Lowery remembers well his meeting with Jerry Garcia.

“Apparently when I met Jerry he had just come out of a porta-potty. I went to shake his hand, but the only thing I could think was ‘there’s no sink in there,’” Lowery said. “Jerry told me he totally loved our song ‘Euro-Trash Girl’ and was trying to work up an arrangement so the Dead could play it. Sadly, he didn’t live long enough to get it done.”

Camper Van Beethoven emerged in the early ‘80s, in the Southern California underground rock scene, but didn’t fit comfortably. They definitely weren’t punk and too quirky to be mainstream. Over the course of five albums, Lowery and his band mates carved their own niche. Similarly, Cracker came up in an era where they were too poppy for grunge and too much of a country influence to rest beside other rock bands. In 2000, Lowery revived Camper and splits his time between bands.

“The music business has gone all the way back to where we started, where we had to do a lot of stuff independently, within our own organization,” Lowery said. “It wasn’t a challenge for me, because I learned how from the Camper Van Beethoven days. When the labels started coming apart, we always knew what to do.”

In a way, Lowery and his bands have always operated both on their own and on their own turns. The window of high-profile success was so brief they didn’t consider changing how they worked.

“The alt-rock bubble or financial bubble,” Lowery said, “where any band together for more than two weeks and three shows got signed was such a brief period in the 20 years of Cracker and my 27 years of recording that it almost seems like a fluke. There was hardly time to adjust.”

After seeing Internet entrepreneurs being praised for the books they wrote about their five-year-old businesses, Lowery decided he might have something to say about his 27 years in the music business and started working on a book that’s part memoir and business manual.

“People give record labels way too much importance in their minds,” Lowery said. “I learned some things doing research for my book. Like, very few labels last more than 10 or 15 years. Most collapse or are absorbed. The average lifespan of an A&R man (a talent scout who works as a liaison between the label and artist) is less than four years. The people who have been around a long time, that have all the experience, are the artists and the managers.”

Keep reading:

Review: Cracker get on this (again) at Crossroads

Concert Review: Cracker and others at the Wakarusa Music Festival (2006)

Smokey Robinson and the Miracles – “I Second That Emotion”

by thedailyrecord, posted in Motown, Song Review

Second Emotion

Smokey Robinson and the Miracles – “I Second That Emotion,” Pop # 4, R&B # 1

By Joel Francis

Smokey Robinson was Christmas shopping with fellow Motown songwriter Al Cleveland when Cleveland let slip the malapropism “I second that emotion.” Intrigued, Robinson penned a lyric about a man disinterested in flirting, fishing for long-term love. In other words, it’s the complete opposite of every Kiss song ever.

The arrangement and delivery is relaxed and easy. Never a forceful singer, Robinson lets the horns punctuate his pleas. His vocals are soft and comforting as a pillow, while Miracle Marv Tarplin’s guitar pulls the song over the unusually subdued percussion. There’s no climax or resolution to the number – the horn breakdown in the final moment is as close as we get. It’s almost like Robinson is auditioning the idea.

The song fades before we learn the woman’s reaction, but audiences were delighted, sending “I Second That Emotion” into the Top 5 and earning the Miracles their sixth million-selling single.

Less than two years later, Diana Ross and the Supremes and the Temptations teamed up for a television special and album. “Diana Ross and the Supremes Join the Temptations” featured their interpretation of “I Second that Emotion,” which was a Top 20 UK hit (the single was not released in America). The album marked the debut of new Temp Dennis Edwards, who replaced the troubled David Ruffin. Miracle guitarist Tarplin reprised his role for the all-star revision. The song has a diverse cover life, with performances issued by Jerry Garcia, ‘80s synth band Japan, and “Stand By Your Man” country singer Tammy Wynette.

The Marvelettes – “The Hunter Gets Captured By the Game”

by thedailyrecord, posted in Motown, Song Review

hunter

The Marvelettes – “The Hunter Gets Captured By the Game,” Pop # 13, R&B #2

By Joel Francis

The Marvelettes gave Motown its first No. 1 hit with “Please Mr. Postman,” but that was way back in 1961. But that was five years before “The Hunter Gets Captured by the Game” came out – a lifetime in pop music. The interceding years weren’t too kind. The group found some follow-up success with “Beechwood 4-5789,” but lost a founding member, and famously passed on “Where Did Our Love Go,” which became the Supremes’ first No. 1 hit.

By the mid-‘60s, the Marvelettes had lost another member. Only the success of greatest hits and live albums were keeping the band tethered to the Motown roster. Then Smokey Robinson entered the picture.

Robinson penned “Don’t Mess With Bill,” the comeback single for the now-trio. His pen also produced “The Hunter Gets Captured by the Game,” sung by Wanda Young, wife of Miracles’ guitarist Bobby Rodgers.

The lyrics are straightforward, but what makes the song is Young’s slinky singing and an equally elastic performance from the Funk Brothers. Check out the great guitar performance holding the whole song together and the great and rare Motown harmonica solo to appear outside of a Stevie Wonder or Shorty Long album.

The Marvelettes found a Top 10 hit with their next single – a remake of Ruby and the Romantics’ “When You’re In Love” – before losing another singer. They carried on with some success, but a full-scale comeback was quashed when the remaining members decided not to follow Berry Gordy to Los Angeles and Young’s pregnancy. After the Marvelettes dissolved, singer Ann Bogan joined New Birth, a soul outfit founded by former Motown staffer Harvey Fuqua.

“The Hunter Gets Captured by the Game” has been covered by Ella Fitzgerald, Raconteur Brendan Benson, Jerry Garcia, Blondie and Massive Attack. A reggae cover by Grace Jones reached No. 87 on the R&B charts in 1980.

“Together Through Life” is a minor masterpiece

by thedailyrecord, posted in Album review

ttl

By Joel Francis

After delivering three “important” albums in the past dozen years, it’s nice to know Bob Dylan can make an album without making a statement.

“Together Through Life” feels like an afternoon drive through a dusty Texas border town with the windows rolled down. Much of that feel comes from the ubiquitous accordion played by David Hildago of Los Lobos. Lyricist Robert Hunter – who co-wrote all but one of “Life”’s tunes with Dylan and is best known  for writing “Casey Jones” and other songs with the Grateful Dead – deserves some credit for the record’s lack of ponderousness.

But lack of weight doesn’t equal a lightweight record in this case. The album is a cousin to “New Morning,” a solid, offering that is overshadowed by the albums surrounding it and filled with songs Dylan recorded because he wanted to, not because he had something to say.

Sonically, the album is cut from the same cloth that has defined Dylan’s previous ‘00’s offerings. It is a pastiche of Chess blues, Sun Records country and rock and pre-war pop. While there’s nothing as sunny as “Silvio,” a track Dylan and Hunter collaborated on 20 years ago, there’s also nothing as forgettable as “Ugliest Girl in the World,” the other fruit borne of that union.

Guitarist Mike Campbell from Tom Petty’s Heartbreakers adds light acoustic guitars and mandolin to most tracks, but drops a murky electric guitar reminiscent of Neil Young on “Forgetful Heart.”  Lyrically the song resembles the material for “Time Out Of Mind,” right down to the dark lyrics: “The door has closed, if indeed there ever was a door.”

While Dylan albums are rarely sunny endeavors, the gloom of “Forgetful Heart,” and the sarcasm of “It’s All Good” are broken by upbeat numbers like “Jolene” and “Shake Mama Shake” – both of which sound like they came from the Chess Studios at 2120 S. Michigan Avenue circa 1958. The tongue-in-cheek “My Wife’s Hometown” might be Dylan’s funniest number since his knock-knock joke in “Po’ Boy “ while “I Feel A Change Coming On” has a twilight optimism.

Fans have grown accustomed to waiting nearly five years between new offerings. “Together Through Life” is surprise arrival little more than two years after “Modern Life.” “Life”’s runtime of 10 tracks and 45 minutes and lack of “statement song” like “Highlands” or “Ain’t Talkin’” make a tempting case to write the album off as a lesser work. Although it will never measure among the first-tier cannon, those who dismiss it do so at their own folly.