World Vocals

1. Fried Glass Onions: Memphis Meets the Beatles by Various Artists
2. Blue Ladies: Classic Blues Performances 1922-1925 by Various Artists
3. Memphis Rain by Sandy Carroll
4. At the Same Place Twice in Life by Klaudia & Rico with the Flying Helmets

  It constantly amazes me how so many really good musicians and singers labor away in obscurity while some others with no more talent, sad to say, often rise to the top. Is it drive, conviction, ego, or just plain dumb luck? Often it's a combination of things.

 The Inside Sounds label in Memphis, TN is trying to do something about it by recording local talent for posterity and re-realizing old recordings from the 78 to the cd format.

 One great talent who deserves more recognition is singer/pianist Sandy Carroll whose MEMPHIS RAIN cd overflows with yummy gospel influenced blues and boogie tunes, with a taste of gumbo on the side.  Fans of Tracy Nelson and Marsha Ball could really relate to the sounds Sandy is putting down.

 Sandy's a little rougher grade of sandpaper in the voice than either of the two aforementioned ladies, but she can smooth it out when she wants to, unlike someone like Rod Stewart.

 Producer James Solberg plays some hot Albert King-style guitar on some cuts, but switches to a softer background sound when called for. Nice job, James.   I particularly liked the tunes 'Honey Lovin Gumbo', 'Good Line', and 'Memphis'. Sandy enjoys down to earth, somewhat salty lyrics.

 Of the twelve tunes on MEMPHIS RAIN, Sandy wrote or co-wrote eleven of them. Will someone put this lady on Austin City Limits?  If she added a little country to her repertoire like Marsha and Tracy did, her career would undoubtedly move up a notch - meantime, if you love blues, you'll love Sandy Carroll.

 I have to admit, the first time I listened to Klaudio and Rico's AT THE SAME PLACE TWICE IN LIFE, I didn't like it. I never made it beyond the first three cuts; I put it aside.  Months later I listened again - I still didn't like it; but this time I left it on while working on a project, and somewhere towards the middle of the cd it began to get to me.

 The voice that sounded so off on the first cut sounded so right on so many other songs: the lead vocalist sounds a bit like Joni Mitchell on 'High Heel Shoes', like Judy Collins on other tunes. In fact, the whole cd is a bit of a throwback to the folk-rock days of the mid-60s,  the singer-songwriter sounds of the early 80s, and the 80s power pop sounds that looked back at the folk rock era with fondness.

 Singer Klaudia Ploderer occasionally sounds like a European chanteuse filtered through Joni Mitchell (in fact, Cut 5 was written by Joni Mitchell).  Klaudia is also a musician who plays guitar, melodica, harmonica, recorder and bass. I don't care for her harmonica much - it sounds too much like Bob Dylan and Neil Young - but these two made it real big playing that style, so never mind my opinion.

  The occasional violin of Flying Helmet member Kevin Tallantis is most welcome but only rare.

 Klaudia Ploderer wrote or co-wrote most of the tunes on AT THE SAME PLACE TWICE IN LIFE and is definitely a great folk-rock singer/songwriter find.

 I should have started listening with Cut 4: if the cd could have been released thirty years earlier, it could have been huge.

 The idea for the FRIED GLASS ONIONS project started with the knowledge that the Beatles had almost recorded in Memphis during the heyday of Stax-Volt records. How would that have have changed the sound of some of their later recordings? Probably not as much as having a bunch of Memphis groups record Beatles tunes - but why not try the idea and see?

 The result is FRIED GLASS ONIONS, a take-off on the Beatle song 'Glass Onion', Booker T and the MGs' 'Green Onions' and the idea of Southern music (and food) being fried and greasy.

 Just like the original project where a rock band (The Beatles) would interact with some of Memphis' best soul musicians, FRIED GLASS ONIONS takes rock, soul and blues people and mixes them together. 

 So is this project funky? Yes, it's rockin'. Is it fun? Most definitely. Is it just as good as The Beatles playing with Steve Cropper, Booker T. Jones and the Memphis horns? Well, no - it's not that good - but most of the cuts are way cool.

 For instance, on the 'Long and Winding Road', singer Kevin Paige actually sounds a bit like Paul McCartney crossed with a modern rhythm and blues singer and the horns sound so Southern on 'The Two of Us'. Bob Simon and Eddie Harrison give us a soulful performance that cuts the original. Listen to funky post-Little Water style harmonica on Daddy Mar Orr's version of 'Get Back'.

 The various female vocalists on FRIED GLASS ONIONS reminds me of alternately Tina Turner and Bonnie Bramlett.   The Beatles would have killed to sound this funky.  Remember when Billie Preston was known as the 'fifth Beatle', adding all that funky organ and soulful backup vocal to the later Beatles discs?

 The more I listen to FRIED GLASS ONIONS, the more I like it.

 There have been so many Beatle tribute discs over the years, I initially resisted these soulful sounds - but now I'm converted - and ready for Volume II!

 Before the great country blues recordings (mostly by men) of the 1930s, the 1920s saw a big fad for blues recordings: primarily female vocalists with jazz bands. The great majority of these women sang on the Negro version of the Vaudeville circuit. Blues was only one of the styles they sang. Most lived and worked in cities.

 Many were from the North (Ma Rainey being the most famous exception to this rule). As a result, their diction is closer to that of the mainstream white society of the time while the country blues performers so revered since the folk boom of the early 1960s (most of whom started recording in the very late 1920s, nearly 1930s) have regional and racial accents so thick many urbanites could not understand the lyrics to their songs.

 Most of these ladies have had some songs reissued before, some as early as the 1950s, but never have I heard such clear reissues as on this disc BLUE LADIES.  I can hear each individual note, I can understand nearly every word. What I can't hear are the clicks, pops and general noise associated with recordings from this era: how delightful to have a convenient cd that sounds better than my 33 1/3 vinyl reissues - and this from a small, independent label in Memphis Tennessee, no less.

 If you're not already familiar with the recordings of the "Smith Girls" Mamie, Clara,. Bessie and Trixie (none of whom are related to each other, by the way), you need to get acquainted - not to mention Ma Rainey, Ethel Waters, Lucille Hegamin, Ida Cox - and nearly a dozen others.

 Vocal and blues collections refer to these recordings as the classic era of blues and jazz recordings, with such a high-quality reissues. BLUES LADIES earns similar commendation, in my book.

  James Keelaghan plays and sings in a style not heard as much - at least, not in the USA - as it was in the 1960s and early 170s. He's a singer/songwriter with strong roots in the folk revival with hints of bluegrass and is often accompanied by a banjo along with his acoustic guitar. Violin and steel guitar pop up from time to time.

 Apparently he has several albums out and the recordings on THEN AGAIN are re-recordings of old favorites. He's very well known in his native Canada and quite a respected songwriter there. (It amazes me that so few Canadian artists are well known in the USA: perhaps if the Beatles and The Rolling Stones had been froom Canada....)

 James writes in an older style no longer popular with mass audiences, and some of the songs on THEN AGAIN sound as though they could have been written hundreds of years ago.  In the early 1960s 'folk singers' would deliberately write this way: it's good to know someone somewhere is carrying on this tradition.

 James Keelaghan deserves a bigger audience, but touring the USA and the UK can be a grinding experience.

 If you've been on a picket line or demonstration in the last ten years or so, you may have heard or even sung James' song 'Hold Your Ground': a grand song in a grand tradition.