Zoe Muth--- A Little Piece of History

The new album is titled World of Strangers but I thought I would give you a little piece of history--- mine--- because there was a time Zoe's and my histories intersected.  It hasn't happened often, these brushes with musicians I believe will, in time, work their ways to the top.  With Zoe, it started with a road trip to the coast of Oregon (a 60-mile drive from the Willamette Valley where I live), a stack of CDs and a desire to get caught up on some listening.    The road trip was both a miserable failure and a tremendous success--- I only listened to one album but it was Zoe Muth & The Lost High Rollers, the first by Zoe and band, and it looped until I was once again back in the Valley, anxious to get to the computer to write something--- anything--- about this outstanding new artist and band.  I titled the "review" I Have Heard the Future of Country Music and It Is the Past and in it I raved about the band and the album.  (Read it here)  It would not be my only time.

Indeed, I have written about Muth many times since, from a review of their first appearance at Cottage Grove's Axe & Fiddle (read that here) to a return appearance the next summer (read that here) to various reviews of the first two albums (Zoe Muth & The Lost High Rollers) and (Starlight Hotel) and the following EP (Old Gold).  It seems every time she steps onto a stage or into a studio, I tug at the reins, wanting to write more.  Sometimes I think she reads my mind because she just handed me another album for just that purpose.

There is something about Zoe's voice which is salve to my soul.  I had pretty much given up on Country music by the time she came along.  Nashville had turned glitz and glamor and the music so formula you could make baby food with it.  The "stars" acted the same, looked the same, wore the same clothes and, shudder, played the game of Hollywood to the point of nausea. They still do.

Not Zoe, though.  She came out of Seattle performing her songs in her way and never thought about formulae.  Sure, she fits well in the Country category, but this is a Country with which I am comfortable.  I knew it from the first notes of You Only Believe Me When I'm Lying, track one, record one.  Zoe is, to me, someone very special and very unique.  It is in her songwriting and in her soul, but more than anything it is in her voice.

That voice is centerpiece of World of Strangers.  Surrounded by more production than her previous albums, her voice cuts through the slick so well that you don't even notice.  Nine originals and one song written by Ronnie Lane (April Fool) make this a smooth ride through real country and not that of Nashville.  No trenchcoats and pleather cowboy hats for her.  Simple songs written for and from the heart.

She doesn't do it alone, either.  She has a band, and producer George Reiff filled the studio nicely on various tracks with superb vocalists and musicians including Jenn Miori and Beth Chrisman (The Carper Family), Bruce Robison, and Brandy Zdan. 

Is this her best album yet?  I can't say because everything she has released is top shelf.  Chances are that people who buy the new album are going to want to backtrack and the people who have earlier albums will want this one too.  They are that good, as is she.

Note:  The music in the videos posted in this review besides Mama Needs a Margarita are not from World of Strangers, but they will give you an idea of what that album holds.  They are true Zoe Muth without embellishment.

Frank O. Gutch Jr.

(Frank Gutch Jr. writes and has written for numerous magazines and websites, presently including this blog, his own website and the prestigious Don't Believe A Word I Say site put together by musician and music pundit Bob Segarini, out of Toronto. He specializes in the Indies, having fought hand-to-hand combat with major record labels for decades (talk about zombies). He believes music should be the core of the music business, though business it mostly be, and denies the accepted reality in the stead of the artistic one. Seldom does he receive pay for articles and/or reviews and believes that there is no place for negatives in a world in which one cannot keep up with the positives. He is, in a sense, a lost soul in a sea of music, drowning, but drowning gratefully.)

Tinsley Ellis--- Get It! and Midnight Blue--- Album Reviews

Tinsley Ellis.  Hell of a name.  Maybe not Phil Villapiano or Biff Pocoroba, but it is doubtful that either one of those guys could play guitar like Tinsley.  Of course, Tinsley probably can't play football or baseball like either one of those guys, either.  Doesn't bother me as long as ol' Tinsley keeps putting out albums like Get It! and Midnight Blue.  'at Tinsley's got a touch, he has.

I first heard of him back in the late-80s when he signed with Alligator Records.  The label hyped him like he was the second coming of the blues or something and I have to admit to be pretty damn impressed.  He could sing and play guitar.  And he had the blues in his soul.  Electric blues.  Rockin' blues.

I lost track of him shortly after '90 or so, leaving the record business behind for more immediate concerns.  Occasionally he would put a blip on the radar--- enough so that I knew where he was.  Early last year, though, he blasted onto the scene with an instrumental album which caught me by surprise.  All instrumental, all the time.  When I was a kid, instrumental albums were all the rage, but that was back before rockers learned how to sing, I think.  Artists and groups like Duane Eddy, Dick Dale, The Ventures, and Floyd Cramer built musical dynasties on the backs of the instrumental, as have Ingwie Malmsteen, Gary Hoey, Buckethead, and Steve Morse in more recent days.  In those traditions, Tinsley pulls strings on a plethora of musical styles while featuring the guitar on a variety of levels, though always upfront.  No show-off stuff, though.  The music stands on its own and, yes, Tinsley bends strings and crunches chords, but that is what he does.  He spans decades in his choice of styles, preferring his own compositions over the standards with the exception of Sonny Thompson's Freddy's Midnite Dream and Ellas McDaniel's Detour.  Get It! is 50s-to-present in less than an hour, but not much less.  Tinsley gives you your money's worth and lovers of guitar instrumentals should love it.

The Tinsley I knew back in the 80s had a Chicago or Southern feel to most of his tunes, the guitar edgy, the band electric.  While the music was blues-rooted, the sound was rock.  He's still rocking, but there is more of a maturity these days--- more of the modern masters in his tones.  Surrender borrows as much from B.B. King as anyone, It's Not Funny from New Orleans artists such as The Neville Brothers.  Tinsley trips around the edges of soul and early R&B as well as decades of blues and rock to get the mix on Midnight Blue.  Ten original tracks, all with plenty of guitar and Tinsley's patent vocals.

Get It!--- Production: A-.  Performance: A-.  Choice of Material/Songwriting:  B.

Midnight Blue--- Production: A.  Performance: A.  Songwriting: A-.

Frank O. Gutch Jr.

(Frank Gutch Jr. writes and has written for numerous magazines and websites, presently including this blog, his own website and the prestigious Don't Believe A Word I Say site put together by musician and music pundit Bob Segarini, out of Toronto. He specializes in the Indies, having fought hand-to-hand combat with major record labels for decades (talk about zombies). He believes music should be the core of the music business, though business it mostly be, and denies the accepted reality in the stead of the artistic one. Seldom does he receive pay for articles and/or reviews and believes that there is no place for negatives in a world in which one cannot keep up with the positives. He is, in a sense, a lost soul in a sea of music, drowning, but drowning gratefully.)

She's a Little Lonely and Freakishly Good

That's what she calls herself, Julie Cain, and you can't blame her for picking a bit of an outlandish name in these days of white noise.  There are seemingly ten thousand records recorded and released a week and finding the ones worth spending your time with can be a chore, if not a tremendous mental challenge.  The name could help, so Little Lonely it is and after hearing her new self-titled album, I'm finding that I really don't care.  As always, the truth is in the grooves and this album is as groovy as it comes.

There are some beautiful songs in this package--- the almost Bali Hai-ish in feel Buttonwillow;  the steeped-in-lonely The First Time You Left Me with the guitar almost crying in its cradle of reverb and echo;  Interstate Hum which caught me right off with its Zoe Muth & The Lost High Rollers aura (Zoe, you want to cover anything, please cover this);  the midtempo and flowing rocker, Jesus Is In My Swimming Pool, very Sarah Borges in its separation of verse and chorus.  Penny's First Available has a slight fifties feel and could as easily have ended up on a Drifters album as anywhere.

 I suppose one would have to label this Americana if for no other reason that there are so many different influences.  Country, when the pedal steel dominates.  Pop, when melody is the focus.  Folk, fifties and sixties.  Always within the range of Julie's little girl voice on certain songs, her perfectly mature voice on others.  She reminds me of an early Brenda Lee, altering said voice to fit the songs.  And, as aformentioned, the songs are outstanding.

There is a new video of Interstate Hum, by the way, an exclusive at this time, being previewed at turnstyledjunkpiled.com.  It's pretty cool.  So is the ezine, one of the first to hop on the Little Lonely bandwagon.  What can I say?  They obviously have taste.

I swear to God, musicians are an untrusting lot.  More than a few albums have included hidden or secret tracks and I would not be surprised to find them included just for writers, for we are a lazy lot and famed for needle-dropping (a term used for listening to the first five or ten seconds of a track rather than all the way through).  So musicians and producers set traps.  On this album, it is set visibly as the album-ender.  Old US 40 is, oddly, a recording of ambient sounds recorded on, I assume, Old US 40.  Ambient sounds.  Wind.  Thunder in the distance.  No music.  No vocal.  I picture Julie sitting by her computer rubbing her hands in delicious anticipation of the review which mentions it as an actual song.  Devious.  Very devious.

I know the big dream is the major label deal, even in an industry imploding on itself.  This album is as good as anything the major labels have put out in the past fifty years.  Excellent production by Sean Hoffman and a crew of sidemen perfect for the job.  And Julie is certainly no slouch herself.  She writes like a pro, sings like an angel and has a sense of humor about life.  As far as I'm concerned, she is already a star.  She doesn't need a major label.  She just needs to be heard.

That sense of humor?  Watch this.  Cracks me up every time.

Frank O. Gutch Jr.

(Frank Gutch Jr. writes and has written for numerous magazines and websites, presently including this blog, his own website and the prestigious Don't Believe A Word I Say site put together by musician and music pundit Bob Segarini, out of Toronto. He specializes in the Indies, having fought hand-to-hand combat with major record labels for decades (talk about zombies). He believes music should be the core of the music business, though business it mostly be, and denies the accepted reality in the stead of the artistic one. Seldom does he receive pay for articles and/or reviews and believes that there is no place for negatives in a world in which one cannot keep up with the positives. He is, in a sense, a lost soul in a sea of music, drowning, but drowning gratefully.)