Stranger Songs with Mike Regenstreif – CKCU – April 9, 2024: Songs I’ve Heard Tom Rush Sing

Stranger Songs with Mike Regenstreif finds connections and develops themes in various genres. The show is broadcast on CKCU, 93.1 FM, in Ottawa on Tuesdays from 3:30 until 5 pm (Eastern time) and is also available 24/7 for on-demand streaming.

This episode of Stranger Songs was recorded and can be streamed on-demand, now or anytime, by clicking on “Listen Now” at … https://cod.ckcufm.com/programs/595/64667.html

Theme: Songs I’ve Heard Tom Rush Sing.

Tom Rush – who is now 83 years old – has been performing and recording for more than 60 years. This show includes songs from Tom’s new album, “Gardens Old, Flowers New,” as well as other artists doing songs Tom has recorded over the years.

Tom Rush- Sailing

Gardens Old, Flowers New (Appleseed) 

Woody Guthrie- Do Re Mi

This Land is Your Land: The Asch Recordings Vol. 1 (Smithsonian Folkways)

Ian Tyson- Windy Bill

Old Corrals and Sagebrush & Other Cowboy Culture Classics (Stony Plain)

Eric Von Schmidt- Joshua Gone Barbados

Baby, Let Me Lay It On You (Gazell)

Blind Willie McTell- Statesboro Blues

The Rough Guide to Blind Willie McTell (World Music Network)

Tom Rush- Gimme Some of It

Gardens Old, Flowers New (Appleseed) 

The Duhks- Mighty Storm

Fast Paced World (Sugar Hill)

Lauren Sheehan- I Wish I Could Shimmy Like My Sister Kate

The Light Still Burns (Wilson River)

Emmylou Harris- No Regrets

Bluebird (Reprise)

Bruce Cockburn- One Day I Walk

Greatest Hits (1970-2020) (True North)

Jesse Winchester- Biloxi 

Jesse Winchester (Stony Plain) 

Tom Rush- The Harbor

Gardens Old, Flowers New (Appleseed) 

Joni Mitchell- Urge for Going

Archives – Volume 2: The Reprise Years (1968-1971) (Rhino)

Murray McLauchlan- Old Man’s Song

Songs from the Street: The Best of Murray McLauchlan (True North)

Eddie Holstein- Jazzman

Eddie Holstein (Eddie Holstein)

David Wiffen- Driving Wheel

David Wiffen (Fantasy)

Tom Rush- It All Comes Down to Love

Gardens Old, Flowers New (Appleseed) 

3’s a Crowd- Gnostic Serenade

Christopher’s Movie Matinee (Dunhill)

Michael Smith- This Here Mandolin (Hobo’s Mandolin)

There (Flying Fish)

Bonnie Koloc- Colors of the Sun

Rediscovered (Mr. Biscuit)

Guy Clark- Desperados Waiting for a Train

Keepers: a live recording (Sugar Hill)

Tom Rush- Glory Road 

Gardens Old, Flowers New (Appleseed) 

Tom Rush- One More Time Around the Sun

Gardens Old, Flowers New (Appleseed) 

Next week: New York State of Mind.

--Mike Regenstreif

Stranger Songs with Mike Regenstreif – CKCU – March 12, 2024: The Art of the Long Song, Volume 2

Stranger Songs with Mike Regenstreif finds connections and develops themes in various genres. The show is broadcast on CKCU, 93.1 FM, in Ottawa on Tuesdays from 3:30 until 5 pm (Eastern time) and is also available 24/7 for on-demand streaming.

This episode of Stranger Songs was recorded and can be streamed on-demand, now or anytime, by clicking on “Listen Now” at … https://cod.ckcufm.com/programs/595/64251.html

Theme: The Art of the Long Song, Volume 2.

The songs on this show are all between six and 10 minutes in length.

Chris Rawlings & Mike Regenstreif (2007)

Chris Rawlings- Song of the Old Bush Pilot

Northern Spirits (Cooking Fat Music)

Ian Tamblyn- Tiger Lily Road

Scenes Through a Mirror (North Track)

Marc Nerenberg- Ma Creole Belle

On the Street Again (Marc Nerenberg)

Allison Russell- Requiem

The Returner (Fantasy)

Cat Power- Visions of Johanna

Cat Power Sings Dylan: The 1966 Royal Albert Hall Concert (Domino)

Tom Russell, Eliza Gilkyson & Joe Ely- Lily, Rosemary and the Jack of Hearts

Indians Cowboys Horses Dogs (HighTone)

Mike Regenstreif & Anne Hills (2001)

Anne Hills- Follow That Road

Angle of the Light (Flying Fish)

Eric Von Schmidt- The Captain

Baby, Let Me Lay It On You (Gazell)

Chaim Tannenbaum- London, Longing for Home

Chaim Tannenbaum (StorySound)

Bruce Murdoch- In the Simplest of Ways

Sometimes I Wonder Why the World (Bruce Murdoch)

James Talley- In These Times

Bandits, Ballads and Blues (Cimarron)

The first volume of The Art of the Long Song was heard on the March 29, 2022 edition of Stranger Songs and can be streamed from the playlist at this link. https://cod.ckcufm.com/programs/595/55701.html

Next week: Music.

--Mike Regenstreif

Geoff & Maria Muldaur – Pottery Pie; Sweet Potatoes

GEOFF & MARIA MULDAUR

Pottery Pie

Omnivore Recordings

omnivorerecordings.com/shop/pottery-pie/

Jim Kweskin & the Jug Band were early favorites of mine when I was first getting into music and record collecting as a kid in the 1960s so I was already familiar with (and a fan of) the husband and wife team of Geoff & Maria Muldaur – stalwarts of the Kweskin band – when they recorded Pottery Pie in 1968, the first of two LPs they would release as a duo. Remarkably, Pottery Pie and the other LP, Sweet Potatoes, have just recently been reissued for the first time in North America.

Geoff and Maria alternated lead vocals on Pottery Pie, an album that seemed to point in directions both would go on to explore later on. Geoff’s version of “Death Letter Blues,” for example, is the kind of track he’d record some years later as a member of Paul Butterfield’s Better Days, while Maria’s version of “Me and My Chauffeur Blues,” presaged the tribute to Memphis Minnie she would produce years later.

Geoff’s other highlights on Pottery Pie include a great version of “New Orleans Hopscop Blues,” originally recorded by Bessie Smith, that combines an updated classic blues feel with a New Orleans-style horn arrangement, and a soulful rendition of “Prairie Lullaby,” a classic recorded by Jimmie Rodgers in 1932, that features great playing by Bill Keith on pedal steel and an uncredited fiddler (who I suspect may have been Maria).

And I must mention Geoff’s fun version of “Brazil,” a classic Brazilian jazz tune that would go on to give Terry Gilliam’s film its name when he used this recording in the movie.

Among Maria’s highlights is her sexy definitive version of Bob Dylan’s “I’ll Be Your Baby Tonight” and the traditional gospel song “Trials, Troubles, Tribulations” with nice harmonies from Betsy Siggins.

But my absolute favorite track on Pottery Pie is Maria’s gorgeous version of Hoagy Carmichael’s “Georgia On My Mind,” with a sublime electric guitar solo by Amos Garrett, perhaps the first of many notable guitar solos Amos would play on albums with both Muldaurs.

GEOFF & MARIA MULDAUR

Sweet Potatoes

Omnivore Recordings

omnivorerecordings.com/shop/sweet-potatoes/

While Pottery Pie seemed to be equal parts Geoff and Maria, Geoff dominates Sweet Potatoes, their second and final LP, released in 1972. It’s a charming album, but just a tad disappointing that only three of the 10 songs featured Maria.

That said, some of my favorites of Geoff’s leads include “Havana Moon,” a very atypical Chuck Berry tune given a bluesy arrangement featuring Paul Butterfield on harmonica, and “Dardanella,” a New Orleans jazz standard whose intricate arrangement points at the kind of work Geoff would do decades later with his album of Bix Biederbecke material.

Another favorite is the languid but delightful version of Hoagy Carmichael’s “Lazy Bones,” with a lead vocal and patented guitar solo by Amos Garrett, that certainly presaged the duo album they recorded on Flying Fish after playing together in Paul Butterfield’s Better Days.

Maria’s three lead vocals are also highlights of Sweet Potatoes. These include “Blue Railroad Train,” a Delmore Bothers song that Doc Watson introduced to the folk revival in the mid’60s, and the title track, a lovely little number on which she’s accompanied by pianist Jeff Gutcheon, the song’s composer.

But my absolute favorite is Maria’s beautiful version of “Lover Man (Oh Where Can You Be),” a jazz standard sung decades earlier by Billie Holiday. This version features another dreamy guitar solo by Amos as well as strings and woodwinds – including Geoff on clarinet. 

I should note also that the cover painting for Sweet Potatoes was by the great folk and blues performer and visual artist Eric Von Schmidt.

These two albums are much more than footnotes in the discographies of two artists would go on to give us – and still continue to give us a half-century later – much great music.

Find me on Twitter. twitter.com/@mikeregenstreif

And on Facebook. facebook.com/mikeregenstreif

--Mike Regenstreif

Various Artists – God Don’t Never Change; Mr. Rick Sings About God + Booze

VARIOUS ARTISTS

God Don’t Never Change: The Songs of Blind Willie Johnson

Alligator Records

alligator.com

Like many, my first exposure to Blind Willie Johnson was via his recording of “John the Revelator,” included on Harry Smith’s Anthology of American Folk Music, a monumental collection of recordings from the 1920s and ‘30s that was so influential on the generations of folk-rooted artists that came to the fore in the 1950s, ‘60s and beyond. The artists on the Anthology – including Johnson – are the anchor of what Greil Marcus has termed the “old weird America.”

Johnson could have been one of the deepest sounding of the early bluesmen but was devoutly religious and only sang the gospel and spiritual songs he wrote or adapted from earlier sources. He recorded 30 tracks in all between 1927 and 1930 when the Great Depression effectively killed his recording career – the 2-CD set, The Complete Blind Willie Johnson (Columbia/Legacy) is highly recommended – but many of those songs have become standards of revival folk and blues artists from Bob Dylan and Peter, Paul & Mary to Eric Clapton.

God Don’t Never Change: The Songs of Blind Willie Johnson is a set of 11 of Johnson’s songs performed by an interesting group of contemporary artists.

Tom Waits – whose voice on some of his later recordings seems almost genetically descended from Johnson’s – leads off the set with a compelling version of “The Soul of a Man,” that is built on a sampled guitar track taken from a field recording of Smith Casey recorded by John Lomax and featuring Waits’ wife, Kathleen Brennan, on background vocals and their son, Casey Waits on drums. Waits returns later in the album with “John the Revelator.”

Lucinda Williams, who has a deep understanding of traditional southern music running through much of her own music, also turns in effective performances on two songs: “Nobody’s Fault but Mine,” and the title track, “God Don’t Never Change.”

Interestingly, the only African American artists on the album, the Blind Boys of Alabama, turn in the single performance that seems least influenced by Johnson. Their infectious version of “Mother’s Children Have a Hard Time” is done in their time-honored style reflecting the religious joyousness that is always at the heart of their performances.

Among the other highlights are the call-and-response version of “Keep Your Lamp Trimmed and Burning” by Derek Trucks & Susan Tedeschi; a deeply felt rendition of “Light from the Light House” by Maria McKee; and a subdued, thoughtful reading of “Dark was the Night, Cold was the Ground” by Rickie Lee Jones that effectively brings in a New Orleans-funeral-style horn arrangement near the end of the song.

MR. RICK

Mr. Rick Sings About God + Booze

mrrickmusicamericana.com

One of the Blind Willie Johnson standards not included on God Don’t Never Change was “You’ll Need Someone on Your Bond.” However, Mr. Rick – a.k.a. Rick Zolkower – does a nice, rockabilly-flavored version on Mr. Rick Sings About God + Booze, a mostly upbeat collection of traditional and contemporary Saturday night and Sunday morning songs.

Mr. Rick and his musical friends draw on all manner of roots styles in creating irresistible versions of such God songs as “Hush,” Blind Lemon Jefferson’s “One Kind Favor,” and “I’ll Fly Away,” and such boozers as Eric Von Schmidt’s “Champagne Don’t Drive Me Crazy,” Sleepy John Estes’ “Liquor Store Blues” and Mr. Rick’s own “Don’t Put My Bourbon Down.”

Perhaps my favorite track is “Two Little Fishes,” a biblical story song I first heard sung by Josh White, that takes on a klezmer feel thanks to Jono Lightstone’s clarinet playing.

Find me on Twitter. twitter.com/@mikeregenstreif

And on Facebook. facebook.com/mikeregenstreif

--Mike Regenstreif