Galactic and Irma Thomas Audience With The Queen 2025

New Orleans funksters Galactic have written an entire record (there's one cover song) for the amazing, still great Irma Thomas. At 84, Thomas can still sing like she sang 40 years ago, if not better. Of course if you heard her at the Jazz and Heritage Fest or on After the Rain 2006, Simply Grand 2008, or Love Is The Foundation 2020, you already knew that. Here, her classic soul/blues/gospel style is updated both stylistically and lyrically, and she storms into 2025 backed by the members of Galactic that both revere her and refuse to take a single step back from their funky march forward.

There's new/old school soul Piece In My Heart, Be Your Lady, and People, all of them sounding a tad like the best of Sharon Jones and the Daptones. Funk oozes out of Where I Belong, Love's Gonna Find A Way, and the social message of the great first single, Lady Liberty. Over You is bluesy, and How Glad I Am and Puppet On Your String have gospel overtones. Gang backup vocals, full choir on a few, and frequently super horn charts spruce up the sound. There's hot guitar and keyboards, and the always fabulous drumming of Staton Moore. The arrangements are darn near perfect every time.

And Irma Thomas sings everything to the ground. She had her first hit in 1959, and she's as great as ever right now. She inhabits, indeed embodies, every lyric in a way only a few singers can. She is magnificent.

I thought After The Rain was her late career pinnacle. Then came Love Is The Foundation, and that raised the bar again. This time a rare, beautiful legacy artist charges into the present and gives us something so wonderful it's just hard to even believe. But here it is. Anyone Who Knows What Soul Is (Will Understand).

Van Morrison Live At Orangefield 2024, New Arrangements and Duets 2024

I'm having a real problem keeping up with Van Morrison. Every decade since the 70s, he has released 9 or 10 (that's not guessing, it's accurate) new records. Now in the 2020s, only five years in, he's released 8 records already, and another is due in June 2025. The guy is 79 years old, and clearly won't slow down. I have managed to write about each of them in my Van Morrison series, which you can read here. 

Van Morrison has made several rock solid live records. Live at Austin City Limits Festival 2006 was good, and his live reimagining of Astral Weeks Live at the Hollywood Bowl in 2009 was a blast. It's Too Late to Stop Now 1974 is just one of the best live records ever, and A Night In San Francisco 1994 was a brilliant reworking of his sleepy 80s catalog into funky R&B, and great.

So now comes Live At Orangefield 2024, documenting his live performance at his old secondary school just before it closed in 2014. It is a good selection of songs, and Van certainly seems motivated to perform in the place he gave his first live performance ever as a young school lad in a skiffle group. He can still sing today, so he certainly could do so in 2014. The band is the solid group he'd been touring with for a while, and Dave Keary shines on guitar throughout as do Paul Moran on keys and Alistair White and Chris White on horns. 

There's no surprises, but it is enjoyable almost throughout. Cleaning Windows, Moondance, Precious Time, Real Real Gone, Rough God Goes Riding, they all sound very good. The record ends by fading out during In The Garden as the "no guru, no method, no teacher" chorus is still going on. Why? Maybe he was about to walk off and let the band finish, well then lets hear that. It's not that big of a deal, but it's irritating. They could have left out the spoken word On Hyndford Street, which the crowd loves because he name checks locations throughout Belfast, but for the rest of us, it's the least interesting thing here. So it's a good one but not great one. More on that later.

Also in 2024, we get New Arrangements and Duets, an oddball mix of nine older songs rearranged and six duets, all of which were recorded between 2014 and 2019. About half of it is quite good, some is good enough, and two songs are particularly wrong. So it's a good one but not great one. More on that later.

The highlights: Kurt Elling duetting on Ain't Gonna Moan No More (scatting plus a great trumpet solo), a swinging version of Only A Dream, The Beauty of Days Gone By done up hot and jazzy with more great solos on sax and organ, a funky version of So Complicated that isn't much of a rearrangement from the original, and two fine duets with Willie Nelson(!) on What's Wrong With This Picture? and the lovely Steal My Heart Away, where Willie also contributes with his idiosyncratic guitar playing. 

The only real disappointments are a big band version of I'll Be Your Lover Too, which bulldozes the gentle original, and a duet with Joss Stone on Someone Like You that makes you want to hear Stone do the song without Van crowding her mostly out. The remaining unmentioned songs are all just fine, and some of the new arrangements are improvements, or at least interesting variations, on the originals. 

If you're a fan, both of these are well worth your time. I suppose thinking he's going to come up with one that matches his work in the seventies is a bit like thinking the Rolling Stones will give us another Sticky Fingers.

As for the "it's a good one but not a great one" line, I'll give a fellow blogger the last word. Wardo, an excellent music reviewer who blogs at Everybody's Dummy, left a comment on my most recent Van Morrison entry. He wrote "He keeps making competent, "not-bad" albums...  I will be very surprised if he gives us a modern masterpiece."

Jesse Winchester 1944-2014

This is a guest post by Steve Walmsley

I was already a huge fan of Jesse Winchester when in 1977 my then pregnant wife, Kathryn, and I went to see him in concert at Bogarts, a small venue in Cincinnati. Winchester was a draft evader that had gone to Canada in 1967. He was allowed to return to the US after Jimmy Carter’s amnesty for draft evaders in 1976. Kathryn was resplendent in a long white muslin dress with our first child inside her protruding belly. I was never prouder to be out with her.  We arrived late and it appeared every seat at every table was occupied. Undeterred, we ventured down front to discover that a small table with three chairs right in front of the middle of the stage was empty. We couldn’t believe our luck. It was one of those meant to be moments. It was like having the band in your living room. With the intimacy of the closeness to the band, it remains to this day one of my all-time favorite concert performances. 

I first became aware of Jesse Winchester when, after the breakup in 1970 of the Lemon Pipers (for whom I played bass), I moved to Wilmington Vermont with a three piece group I had formed with my best friend from high school. The band failed and I moved in with a group of hippies, one of whom became my beautiful wife. We will soon be celebrating 53 years together.  

It was there that I was turned on to Jesse’s Winchester’s self-titled classic 1970 eponymous first album. It was produced by Robbie Robertson and recorded by Todd Rundgren. It contains The Brand New Tennessee Waltz, the first song he ever wrote, Yankee Lady (a favorite), and the haunting Quiet About It. It’s the place to begin if you’re not familiar with Winchester.

His 1972 release, Third Down, 110 To Go, is my favorite of all his albums. It displays the beautiful lyrics, simple arrangements and minimal instrumentation that are typical of all his recordings. It is near perfect in it’s deceptive simplicity. Just listen to it. Bob Dylan once said, “You can’t talk about the best songwriters and not include [Jesse Winchester] ”.

The 1974 release, Learn To Love It, has the catchy and endearing Third Rate Romance written by Russell Smith, later of the Amazing Rhythm Aces. The heartfelt Mississippi You’re On My Mind shows the fondness Winchester had for his southern roots. 

In 1976 he released Let The Rough Side Drag. The title song is a lyrical expression of his philosophy of life. I find all his songs both poignant and uplifting. The album ends with a reprisal of his first song, The Brand New Tennessee Waltz. It was eventually covered, as were many of his compositions, by Joan Baez, Ralph Stanley, the Everly Brothers and Patti Paige, who had recorded the original Tennessee Waltz 50 years earlier.

Nothing But A Breeze 1978 contains Twigs and Seeds, a humorous plea for ganja legalization, and a nifty little tune titled Rhumba Man. The album features a who’s who supporting cast of Ricky Scaggs, James Burton, Emmylou Harris, Ann Murray and Nicolette Larson.

1981’s Talk Memphis showed his special affinity for Memphis, as his family moved there from Mississippi when he was six. He was influenced by the sounds of rhythm and blues and rockabilly via radio stations like WDIA and WHBQ where Dewey Phillips was playing the mixture of black and white artists that came to characterize Sun and Stax Records. The title song Talk Memphis is an homage to this early influence. This album also contains his only US Top 40 single, Say What. 

In 2007 he received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers.

In 2009 he released his tenth studio album, the well-received Love Filling Station. 

In 2012 a tribute record to Jesse, Quiet About It, was released that featured Jimmy Buffett, Elvis Costello, James Taylor, Lye Lovett, Roseanne Cash, Allen Toussaint and Lucinda Williams.

Jesse Winchester passed away in 2014. His final album titled A Reasonable Amount Of Trouble was released later that year with liner notes by his friend Jimmy Buffett, who recorded six of Winchester’s songs over the years. The record was nominated for two Grammys. Rolling Stone called it “one of the most moving, triumphant albums of Winchester’s 45 year career “ and “a gentle collection of playful songs about love, memory and gratitude”. The same could be said for most of the songs he ever wrote.

The Lemon Pipers Green Tambourine 1968 Jungle Marmalade 1968

The Lemon Pipers' story is a classic from the late sixties. Classic in that they were actually two bands. They were the hard rocking/blues/country/folk/psychedelic band from Oxford, Ohio, and they were the bubblegum pop band they were forced to be by the Kama Sutra record label they signed to, not realizing that they would have little to no control over their material. 

It is somewhat surprising then that they were allowed to record their own songs in addition to the the many bubblegum pop tunes penned by producer Paul Leka and songwriting partner Shelly Pinz. They made two records, both released in 1968, and both records included plenty of the Leka/Pinz material and a reasonably heathy dose of Lemon Pipers originals. The bubblegum fans that bought those records must have wondered what was going on when the bands' originals came out of their speakers.

The Wikipedia entry about the Lemon Pipers is mostly accurate. How do I know this? My older brother was the bass player in the Lemon Pipers, and in February 1968 when Green Tambourine hit #1, he had his fifteen minutes of fame, and then some. Gold record on the wall, all very cool. For my brother, the best moment of all was when the Lemon Pipers played the Fillmore (and Winterland) on a bill that included Spirit, Traffic, and Moby Grape.

My brother, we'll call him Steve Walmsley, since that is his name, loved Moby Grape, and admired their bass player because he was excellent. Moby Grape were standing in the wings checking out the Lemon Pipers, and Bob Mosley, bassist with Moby Grape, gave my brother the thumbs up from the wings. Of all the star moments that happened on the roller coaster of having a #1 one-hit wonder, that was the moment most cherished by Steve. And why not? Getting approval from one of your idols (when you're nineteen), well, ain't that the shit.

Here's a picture of Steve (left), Ivan Browne (vocals and guitar), and Bill Bartlett (lead guitar, vocals) from the early days of the band:

The band also included Bill Albaugh (drums) and Bob Nave (organ and vocals). And here's one of Steve in 2007 in Cincinnati at a Lemon Pipers reunion concert:

I saw them live on the Green Tambourine tour in June 1968 with my parents in Cleveland. Rotary Connection opened, with the amazing five-octive voice of Minnie Ripperton. I was 13. I also saw that 2007 reunion in Cincinnati.

I put together a playlist of the Lemon Piper originals and chosen covers from their two albums, with no Leka/Pinz songs. It is of it's time certainly, but if you want to know how very not bubblegum they were, this will do it. Each song plays in YouTube.

The Real Lemon Pipers tracklist:

Catch Me Falling (Lemon Pipers) Lead Vocal: Browne

Straglin' Behind (Albaugh/Bartlett) LV: Browne

No Help From Me (Browne) LV: Nave

    No Help was surprisingly the flip side of the Green Tambourine single, but not on the album

I Was Not Born To Follow (Goffin/King) LV: Browne

Through With You (Bartlett) LV: Browne/Bartlett

Ask Me If I Care (Eric Ehrmann) LV: Browne

Hard Core (Lemon Pipers) LV: Nave

Turn Around Take A Look (Bartlett) LV: Bartlett/Browne

Fifty Year Void (Lemon Pipers) LV: Nave

Wine And Violet (Lemon Pipers) LV: Bartlett/Browne

Dead End Street/Half Light (Lemon Pipers) LV: Nave/Browne

The Lemon Pipers split in the spring of 1970. All five members stayed active in music in one way or another. Bartlett and Nave formed Beachwood Farm. Then in 1972 Bartlett and Walmsley formed Starstruck. After Walmsley was replaced by David Goldflies (later of Allman Brothers), Starstruck recorded Bartlett's version of Leadbelly's Black Betty. The same recording would be used later when it was credited to Bartlett's Ram Jam (Interestingly, that means that Bill Bartlett was a one-hit wonder, twice). Walmsley played in Backporch Light with Kieth Sherman and Slipstream with Meg Davis, and then in the band that backed the soul vocal group The Fabulous Determinations. Walmsley and Albaugh joined Bruce Newman in Medicine Wheel. Bartlett joined and later Newman left. Walmsley, Albaugh, and Bartlett played in local bands Midnight Fire in the 80s and Mystical Presence in the 90s. Walmsley last played in Second Nature from 2003-2009. All of these bands played in the Southern Indiana/Ohio area.

Ivan Browne moved to California, became a postal carrier, played and recorded music with his wife in the Ivan and Isa Band, and carried on his minor celebrity as lead singer of Green Tambourine. Bob Nave became a financial consultant by day and a popular jazz DJ on WNOP-AM in the 70s and then at WVXU-FM from 1984 to 2005. In 2006, Nave was a founding member of Cincinnati's Blues Merchants. 

2007, 2008, and 2017 saw Lemon Pipers reunions with Browne, Walmsley and Nave in Cincinnati.

Albaugh passed away in 99, and Nave died in 2020.

There's a good article from Cincinnati Magazine in 2008 called Off The Charts. Lots of details, and all four surviving members were interviewed.

Tracy Nelson Life Don't Miss Nobody 2023

A mere sixty years after her first record, Tracey Nelson graces us with yet another fine piece of work. That 1964 debut, Deep Are The Roots, was a sparse acoustic record of blues chestnuts with vocals, guitar, harmonica and occasional piano. It was fairly ordinary for that sort of thing, but Tracey’s vocals impressed the few that heard it. Next up was the first Mother Earth record in 1968 after Tracey moved to San Francisco and founded the band. Since then she’s recorded some 20 records for at least half that many different labels. A journey woman for sure, and even if she’s not a household name, any and all of her work is well worth hearing.

It had been ten years since her last record, and fans had reason to wonder if she was done. Not nearly. She produced this new one, curated a great set of songs and wrote a couple herself, put together a killer band, and invited several big names and friends to guest star. At seventy-nine, she hasn’t lost any of the vocal strength and interpretive skill she’s famous for, and dare I say, this may well be her finest work. 

A blues singer mainly, she has recorded country, rock, R&B, gospel and soul throughout her career. Her taste in material to cover is impeccable. She's written a bunch of good ones herself, most notably her signature tune Down So Low, which has been covered by Linda Rondstadt, Etta James, Dee Dee Warwick, Ellen McIlwaine, Maria Muldaur, and Cyndi Lauper.

Strange Things Happen Every Day kicks things off rocking a blues/R&B groove, with a great piano break. Kevin McKendree tickles the ivories throughout the record, and he's consistently fabulous. Doc Pompus' There Is Always One More Time features Mickey Raphael's harmonica and a big choir on the gospel choruses. The title track, co-written by Nelson with Mike Dysinger has a latin rhythm and hot horns. Your Funeral and My Trial from Sonny Boy Williamson's pen is a walking blues with more great piano. Ma Rainey's Yonder Comes The Blues is an old-timey blues with wonderful, and apropos clarinet. Marcia Ball and Irma Thomas join Nelson for the rocking Allen Toussaint swamp rock of I Did My Part. The gospel influences return for  a stunning Hard Times, featuring piano, accordion and the big choir again. Wow.

Willie Nelson guests on Hank Williams' Honky Tonkin', with steel guitar and more fine harmonica. Charlie Musselwhite, who was featured on that 1964 debut, plays knock-out harmonica on It Don't Make Sense, a Willie Dixon blues that also has a hot guitar break. Eugene McDaniels' Compared To What features Terry Hanck on sax playing off the piano in a tight dual solo section. Nelson co-wrote Where Do You Go When You Can't Go Home with Marcia Ball, and the gospel choir again rocks the choruses. A nice rocking version of Chuck Berry's Brown-Eyed Handsome Man features a bevy of female guests vocalists and rocks like crazy. The record ends with another version of Hard Times, this time with just Tracey and guitar to wind things down with deep emotion, in the simple acoustic style of her 1964 debut, bringing things full circle.

There isn't a weak song. The record was nominated for a 2024 Best Traditional Blues Record Grammy. Tracey sings everything with the powerful voice that is her trademark. If you're a blues fan or a Tracey Nelson fan, or heck, just a good music fan, you gotta hear it.

Songbird: An Intimate Biography of Christine McVie Lesley-Ann Jones

I'll start right off with the conclusion of this review: don't bother.

Supposedly the author was a friend of Christine McVie. Clearly McVie was a very private person, and if Jones was her friend, she certainly was not an intimate one, regardless of the book's title. Just how revealing was a guarded rock star with a rock journalist "friend"? I would speculate that the answer is "not so much".

And so speculation is what Jones does repeatedly in an attempt to explain McVie's childhood, her relationships with her parents, where her talents came from, and her motivations for many decisions throughout her life. She talks in depth about McVie's phycological background and reasons for her life's pathway with a psychologist that never met Christine McVie. She uses a jealous bass player that wanted but never got John McVie's role in Fleetwood Mac like he is an expert on Christine. 

No family members contributed. No Fleetwood Mac members gave new insights (although they are often quoted from past interviews). No lifelong close friends (real ones) talked to Jones. No neighbors from  Wickhambreaux, the small country town where Christine lived for some fifteen years had anything to say.

There's scant detailed or new information on the Fleetwood Mac records to which Christine famously contributed. In fact, I thought Jones wasn't even going mention Heroes Are Hard To Find, when she went off on a multi-page tangent and discussion of Bob Welsh's departure from the band before she even mentioned Heroes, the last Fleetwood Mac album on which he was featured. She of course spends lots of pages on the famous version of the band, but skims over the 1970-1974 era, when Christine wrote many of the bands best songs during the transitional phase, and helped keep things together before Buckingham and Nicks signed on.

The book covers all the sex, drugs and rock and roll mess and excess that was the famous post 1974 band. There's nothing new here, that story has been told to death. Same with her disastrous love of Dennis Wilson, a brief period of true love for Christine that ended in heartbreak.

If Lesley-Ann Jones was actually a friend of Christine McVie, she would have never written this sham of a biography.

Donald Fagan, Michael McDonald, Boz Scaggs The New York Rock and Soul Review: Live at the Beacon 1991, The Dukes of September Live at Lincoln Center 2014

Not every release you might enjoy needs to be important. Sometimes just "fun", or "nice" or "cool" is all that's needed. That's how I feel about these releases. Neither of them is a good as a good Steely Dan, Boz Scaggs, or Michael McDonald record (Well, maybe not McDonald). But they are well worth your time to hear them.

Both feature the three stars. The New York Rock and Soul Review features additional guest stars worthy of their appearance. And both are backed up by stellar backing musicians and vocalists.

The New York Rock and Soul Review: Live at the Beacon includes Phoebe Snow, Charles Brown, and David and Eddie Brigati, covering Rascals hits, soul gems, Brown's blues, Steely Dan and Doobie Brothers hits. We get hot guitar from Jimmy Vivino and others, and great horns from Cornelius Bumpus and a great horn section. What's not to like?

Twenty years later the three got together and toured. The band included Steely Dan regulars plus all-pro horns and backup singers. Without the guests, we get that much more of Steely Dan and McDonald/Doobies, and considerably more Boz Scaggs, which can only be good. A few choice soul covers round out the set, with the Isley's Who's That Lady? being a standout.

You don't need these records, but you'll probably enjoy your time spent with them.