Stranger Songs with Mike Regenstreif – CKCU – April 29, 2025: “Dublin Blues” and Other Songs of Guy Clark

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/595/69984.html

Theme: “Dublin Blues” and Other Songs of Guy Clark.

Guy Clark – who died in 2016 at age 74 – was a great Texas singer-songwriter who began releasing albums in 1974. In the liner notes to Old No. 1, Guy’s first album, Jerry Jeff Walker referred to Guy’s songs as “the natural music of the acoustic guitar.” These songs were all written or co-written by Guy.

Guy Clark- Dublin Blues

Dublin Blues: 30th Anniversary Edition (Compass)

Nanci Griffith- She Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere

Blue Roses from the Moons (Elektra)

Jerry Jeff Walker- Like a Coat from the Cold

Ridin’ High (MCA Nashville)

Rick Robbins & Ramblin' Jack Elliott- Desperados Waiting for a Train

Walkin’ Down the Line (Seeds of Man)

Guy Clark- That Old Time Feeling

Old No. 1 (Sugar Hill)

Johnny Cash- Let Him Roll

Johnny Cash is Coming to Town (Mercury)

Asleep At the Wheel- Blowin’ Like a Bandit

10 (Epic)

Rosanne Cash- Better Days

This One’s for Him: A Tribute to Guy Clark (Icehouse Music)

Ramblin' Jack Elliott- The Guitar

This One’s for Him: A Tribute to Guy Clark (Icehouse Music)

Guy Clark- Ramblin’ Jack & Mahan

Boats to Build (Asylum)

Bill Hearne- The Cape

Always Trust Your Cape (Howlin’ Dog) 

Willie Nelson- Stuff That Works

Oh What a Beautiful World (Legacy)

Guy Clark- Cold Dog Soup

Cold Dog Soup (Sugar Hill)

Terri Hendrix- The Dark

This One’s for Him: A Tribute to Guy Clark (Icehouse Music)

John Prine & Emmylou Harris- Magnolia Wind

This One’s for Him: A Tribute to Guy Clark (Icehouse Music)

Bill Staines- Lone Star Hotel Café

Old Dogs (Red House)

Emmylou Harris- New Cut Road

Quarter Moon in a Ten Cent Town (Warner Bros./Rhino)

Guy Clark- The South Coast of Texas

Craftsman (Philo)

Suzy Bogguss- Instant Coffee Blues

This One’s for Him: A Tribute to Guy Clark (Icehouse Music)

Doug Cox & Sam Hurrie- Old Friends

Old Friends (Black Hen Music)

Steve Earle- The Randall Knife

Guy (New West)

Guy Clark- Once More With Caution

Dublin Blues: 30th Anniversary Edition (Compass)

Next week: The Banjo Special.

--Mike Regenstreif

The Del McCoury Band – Del and Woody

THE DEL McCOURY BAND

Del and Woody

McCoury Music

woodyguthrie.org/projects/DelandWoody.htm

As I’ve noted before, “Woody Guthrie’s astounding writing career – not just songs; also books, poems, letters, newspaper columns and more – was brief, less than 20 years. He began in the mid-1930s and it was over by about 1954 when he was hospitalized with Huntington’s disease, the hereditary neurological disease that eventually robbed him of his life in 1967 at just 55.

“It wasn’t too much time after Woody’s death that I, as a teenager, discovered his songs, books and records. I’ve been listening and reading for [almost 50] years. More recently, I’ve been fascinated with the work that Nora Guthrie has been doing to bring the thousands of her father’s unheard songs back to life.

“When I first began listening to Woody Guthrie records, and to others doing Woody Guthrie songs, back in the 1960s, it was commonly said that Woody was so driven to write that he must have written about a thousand songs. Through Nora’s work at the Woody Guthrie Archives, we now know there were many more songs, about 3,000, and most of them have never been heard. Whatever tunes or melodies Woody wrote or adapted for them are forgotten or were never known.

“Over the past two decades, some of these songs have come to life in new musical settings by a wide variety of artists – some in album-length projects, some in one-off settings. Among my favorite album-length projects have been Wonder Wheel by the Klezmatics, Ticky Tock by the German artist Wenzel, and Note of Hope by various artists in collaboration with Rob Wasserman. What never fails to astound me is how wide-ranging Woody’s writing was – all of these newly come-to-light songs revealing more clues into the Guthrie mystery – and how adaptable his writing was to so many different styles and musical genres and how it continues to speak to very varied artists.”

Bluegrass legend Del McCoury is another of Nora’s great choices for setting Woody’s lyrics to music. Steeped in traditional bluegrass – he played guitar and sang lead vocals with Bill Monroe and the Blue Grass Boys for a time in the early-1960s – and is widely regarded as one of bluegrass music’s greatest standard bearers. He’s been unafraid of looking for material beyond the bluegrass rules and he’s done some great collaborations with artists ranging from Steve Earle to the Preservation Hall Jazz Band.

On Del and Woody, Del adds a dozen “new” songs to the Guthrie canon while creating one of the best bluegrass albums I’ve heard in years. The lyrics are all Woody’s set to melodies by Del.

The album begins in terrific form with “The New York Trains,” a song Woody wrote in 1940 after his first family – wife Mary Guthrie and their three kids – came by train from Texas to join him in New York. Woody humorously describes the family’s first exposure to New York’s expansive subway system.

Woody’s humor can also be seen in such songs as “Wimmen’s Hats,” a bumpkinny – but good-natured – spoof of women’s headwear; “Cheap Mike,” a complaint about a used car dealer who sold him a “‘48 motor on a ’32 frame”; and “Californy Gold,” a tale of a California Gold Rush prospector who loses his fortune to a gold digger.

Among the most poignant songs are “Left in This World All Alone,” sung by a man left without family or friends, and “Family Reunion,” in which Woody encourages families to stick together and support one another.

Other highlights include a love song, “Because You Took Me in Out of the Rain,” and “The Government Road,” sung from the perspective of an ex-con who finds employment building new roads.

Throughout the album Del, who sings lead and plays guitar, is supported by his virtuoso band – sons Ronnie McCoury on mandolin and Rob McCoury on banjo, Jason Carter on fiddle and Alan Bartram on upright bass, all of whom sing harmony vocals – perhaps the greatest traditional bluegrass band currently active.

Find me on Twitter. twitter.com/@mikeregenstreif

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--Mike Regenstreif

Various Artists – Joy of Living: A Tribute to Ewan MacColl

VARIOUS ARTISTS

Joy of Living: A Tribute to Ewan MacColl

Compass Records

compassrecords.com

ewanmaccoll.co.uk

Last month, I attended a Friends of Fiddler’s Green concert in Ottawa to launch their new album, Old Inventions, and Ian Robb introduced his song, “The Reason Why,” with an anecdote about the first time he sang, as a floor singer, at the Singers Club in London when he was a teenager.

After Ian sang, he was approached by Ewan MacColl (1915-1989), the legendary British folksinger, songwriter and activist who ran the Singers Club with life partner Peggy Seeger. MacColl asked Ian why he sang whatever song it was that he had just performed. The lesson Ian took from the encounter was that a singer (or songwriter) should always have some sort of convincing reason for investing themselves in a song.

Although I never had an opportunity to see MacColl perform live, I have listened to many of his recordings, have had conversations about him with Peggy, and have no doubt that there was always a reason why for every song he ever sang or wrote.

To mark the centennial of his birth, his children with Peggy – Neill, Calum and Kitty MacColl – have assembled Joy of Living: A Tribute to Ewan MacColl, an outstanding, 2-CD collection of 21 of MacColl’s songs performed by an eclectic array of singers from both sides of the Atlantic – some of whom I’ve known personally for many years, others whose own music I’ve listened to over the years, and a few of whom I’ve heard for the first time on this album. And each of them leaves absolutely no doubt as to their reason why.

One of the things I’ve always admired about MacColl’s songwriting is the way he could write, authentically, from others’ perspectives as shown on this album by such songs as Martin Carthy’s version of “I’m Champion at Keeping ‘Em Rolling,” written from the perspective of a British truck driver; Seth Lakeman’s version of “The Shoals of Herring,” written from the perspective of a fisherman; and Marry Waterson’s version “The Exile Song,” written from the perspective of an Irish laborer who had to travel far from home to earn his living.

But the songs of MacColl’s written from others’ perspectives that have always moved me most are those about the Romany travelling people – also known as Gypsies, a term now considered to be derisive. Among those songs included here are poignant versions of “Thirty-Foot Trailer” by Eliza Carthy, “Freeborn Man” by Paul Brady, “Moving On Song” by Norma Waterson and “The Terror Time” by Karine Polwart.

Some of the other highlights here include a beautiful version of “Sweet Thames, Flow Softly,” mainly credited to Rufus & Martha Wainwright, but which equally belongs to their half-sister, Lucy Wainwright Roche, and cousin, Lily Lanken; Montreal singer Chaim Tannenbaum’s exquisite version of “My Old Man,” a song in which MacColl both recalls his father and offers advice to his son; Steve Earle’s version of “Dirty Old Town,” MacColl’s portrait of Salford, the town of his birth; and the finale, a sweet interpretation of “The Joy of Living,” an end-of-life celebration of life and farewell to loved ones sung by David Gray.

And, of course, no tribute to Ewan MacColl would be complete without a version of “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face,” his love song for Peggy which has become a standard recorded by countless folk and pop artists. It’s convincingly performed here by Paul Buchanan.

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--Mike Regenstreif

David Broza – East Jerusalem/West Jerusalem

DAVID BROZA
East Jerusalem/West Jerusalem
S-Curve 
davidbroza.net

(A version of this review was published in the March 3, 2014 issue of the Ottawa Jewish Bulletin.)

Singer-songwriter-guitarist David Broza has long been one of my favourite Israeli artists. In his music, he often combines elements of folk, flamenco, pop and rock styles to create something that is both universal and uniquely his own. Many of his songs are compelling and intense keeping listeners’ attention glued both to the music and to the messages in the songs.

Broza has long advocated Israel’s seeking a comprehensive peace treaty with the Palestinians – one of his most beloved songs is “Yihyeh Tov,” which decades ago became an anthem of the Israeli peace movement – and nowhere is that more clear than on his latest album, East Jerusalem/West Jerusalem.

Broza purposefully recorded the album in an East Jerusalem recording studio owned by a Palestinian and on it he collaborates with a cast of Israeli, Palestinian and American singers and musicians on a repertoire of songs – some of which he wrote or co-wrote, others borrowed from other sources – most of which advocate for peace and co-operation.

The songs on East Jerusalem/West Jerusalem are primarily written and sung in English although a couple of them also have verses in both Hebrew and Arabic. Some of the songs are specific to the Israeli-Palestinian situation while others take on that meaning due to the context of the album, the artist and his collaborators. Several of the songs are controversial just by virtue of who wrote them.

Among the highlights of Broza’s own songs is the title track, “East Jerusalem/West Jerusalem,” which he co-wrote and sings with American-Haitian hip hop artist Wyclef Jean. The song recognizes the essential humanity of all people – Israelis and Palestinians and others from around the world – and expresses a longing for shalom and salaam, and a time when “the world will be a better place.” The musical interaction of Broza’s singing and Jean’s rapping is captivating and convincing.

But, without doubt, the most poignant song on the album is Broza’s musical setting of “The Lion’s Den,” a poem written by Judea Pearl, the Israeli-American university professor, about the horrific murder of his son, journalist Daniel Pearl, by Islamist terrorists in Pakistan. Written and sung as an imagined narrative by Daniel of what he was witnessing in Pakistan in his final days and hours, he observes that unspeakable evil is being committed and justified in God’s name. Although it is sung quietly, “The Lion’s Den” is a song of unmistakable and unforgettable power.

One song that I think misses its intended mark is “Jerusalem,” written by Steve Earle, who co-produced the album. While it’s certainly well intentioned, the song absurdly seems to suggest the conflict between “all the children of Abraham” will be resolved when Jews and Muslims get around to accepting the peaceful teachings of Christianity. The song’s essential message ignores centuries of war and oppression wrought in Jesus’ name. (I made this same point in 2002 when I reviewed Earle’s album, Jerusalem, in the Montreal Gazette.)

I mentioned that several songs are controversial just by virtue of who wrote them. The most notable of these is “Mother” from Pink Floyd’s The Wall, which was written by Roger Waters, perhaps the most fervent anti-Israel boycotter in popular music. Others are “Every Day I Write the Book,” by Elvis Costello, who cancelled a concert in Israel in 2010 following pressure from Palestinian solidarity activists, and “Where Do the Children Play,” by Cat Stevens, a British convert to Islam who is alleged to have provided support to Hamas.

I think that by including those songs Broza is reaching out to anti-Israel boycotters with a message that peace will be found through dialogue, co-operation and collaboration.

If only they could understand that message.

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--Mike Regenstreif