The latest reviews from Kevin Bryan.
Thorbjorn Risager & The Black Tornado, "Songs From The Road" (Ruf RUF 1219)- This splendid audio-visual package provides a richly rewarding showcase for the talents of Danish bluesman Thorbjorn Risager and his finely honed backing band. The contents were recorded live at the Harmonie venue in the former German capital of Bonn earlier this year, and found Risager and his cohorts regaling their highly receptive audience with a heady blend of brass laden blues, soul and rock'n'roll, delivering energised re-vamps of much loved oldies such as "Let The Good Times Roll" and "Baby Please Don't Go" alongside a batch of self-penned show-stoppers led by "High Rolling," "Long Forgotten Track" and "Too Many Roads."
Dave Rawlings Machine, "Nashville Obsolete" (Acony Records)- The second solo offering from melancholic Americana luminary Gillian Welch's longstanding musical sidekick was recorded in glorious analog at Woodland Sound Studios in Nashville. Rawlings yearning tenor vocals and endlessly inventive guitar work occupy centre stage as he indulges his passion for downbeat Dust Bowl acoustic balladry via haunting ditties such as "Bodysnatchers Lament" and a rambling, eleven minute long epic entitled "The Trip."
Stone the Crows, "Teenage Licks / Ontinuous Performance" (Angel Air)- This CD re-issue brings together the last two albums that this Glaswegian outfit recorded before guitarist and creative mainstay Les Harvey's untimely death in an onstage accident at Swansea's Top Rank in May 1972. The band bravely soldiered on for a while with Jimmy McCulloch stepping manfully into Harvey's shoes, but their eventual demise always seemed inevitable, and they finally gave up the ghost a year or so later. They did bequeath a fine body of work to posterity during their short time together however, and newcomers to Stone the Crows' gritty brand of bluesy rock would be well advised to lend an ear to tracks such as "Penicillin Blues," "Big Jim Salter" and the elegaic "Sunset Cowboy."
James Gilchrist, "Schumann: Song Cycles" (Linn Records)- James Gilchrist is best known for his highly regarded recordings of English language material, but the expressive classical tenor's latest collaboration with pianist Anna Tilbrook finds him venturing into unfamiliar musical territory as he immerses himself in the emotional subtleties of the Germanic Lieder repertoire. The duo deliver captivating performances of three of the finest examples of the song cycle genre, including the superb "Dichterliebe," Robert Schumann's sublimely realised settings of poems by Heinrich Heine.
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