I've been listening to a lot of Jayhawks lately, and I have renewed my love of the band. Hollywood Town Hall is among my all-time favorites, but they made more hits than misses.
Along the way while digesting so much Jayhawks also came a couple of solo offshoots of the band.
Gary Louris' Vagabonds is really good. Produced by Chris Robinson, and staffed by an alternate Jayhawks band, they try fairly hard to not sound like the Jayhawks, and succeed as much as you'd want them to. The biggest sound change comes from the vocals. Eschewing the three part harmonies of the Jayhawks and replacing them with a nine member choir (with several famous names among them) for back-up vocals works well, and more than any other factor, makes this sound not like the Jayhawks.
Add to that a few songs that are somewhat experimental and markedly different also gives this a "solo record" sound, but it's still Louris. The opener True Blue sounds the most like a Jayhawks tune, and a good one. Omaha Nights gets a big rock treatment, as does We'll Get By. To Die A Happy Man, She Only Calls Me On Sundays, and I Wanna Get High show some different sides of Louris to good effect. It's easy to see these as songs he may have written previously and knew they weren't Jayhawks material. The record ends strong with the title track, D.C. Blues, and Meandering all exhibiting fine songwriting and well-crafted arrangements.
Just like a Jayhawks record, it's about the songs, and this one has the songs. It is fun to hear him try to sound different and succeed. And Louris' vocals are excellent throughout.
I also stumbled upon a record I bought, listened to a few times, and then it got lost in the stacks, all but forgotten. Tim O'Reagan's eponymous debut is in many ways what you might expect from a pent-up songwriter/drummer just waiting to cut loose. It shouldn't come as a surprise that it plays like a folk/country/Americana experiment given his Jayhawks connection. I wish I could be more enthusiastic, and the record has interesting moments, but it's not going to impress after his work with Jayhawks.
O'Reagan has a thin high-pitched voice just made for harmonies, but not so much as a lead singer. He's a fine drummer, and at least a passing guitarist, and an interesting lyricist. He writes some pretty melodies, but the hooks and catchy choruses mostly evade him. Most of the record is fairly simple country/folk with good lyrics and underdeveloped melodies. There are nice touches of piano, accordion, and guitar that keep things from being dull.
Near the end things get better. The last four or five songs are the most interesting, one is even uptempo, something the record could use a lot more of.
All of the Jayhawks participate, and there are several other artists that contribute. I guess the biggest problem is a lack of great songs, but his voice isn't really strong enough either.
The bad news (or good?) is that you'll probably never hear it. There's three songs on YouTube, nothing on Bandcamp or streaming services. There's very affordable copies on Discogs.
No comments:
Post a Comment