Hans Theessink : Jedermann Remixed

Come tutti sapranno il festival di Salisburgo è uno dei piu' imporanti festival per gli amanti della musica operistica e lirica. Si tiene ogni anni nella citta' che diede i natali ad uno dei piu' grandi geni della musica europea ossia Mozart ed è seguito da tantissime persone, un vero e proprio evento nazionale, con i giovani nella piazze a farla da padrona. Ed è proprio in questo contesto, che nel 1920, quando forse nessuno ancora capiva cosa sarebbe successo, venne presentato sul palco princiapale di quel festival lo Jedermann, divenuto da allora uno dei momenti piu' importanti e piu' seguiti dell'intero festival ( clicca qui x maggiori info Jedermann ). Si tratta della rappresentazione di una novella dove l'uomo , ( rappresentato dal ricco Jedermann ), Dio e la Morte si impersonificano e ci accompagnano durante il nostro ultimo giorno per farci prendere consapevolezza di quanto e come abbiamo vissuto. Da questa rappresentazione è stato tratto un film e la colonna sonora scelta per rappresentare questo viaggio esistenziale è la musica che piu' di ogni altra si adatta con l'anima : l'essenzialita' del Blues. E chi in Austria avrebbero potuto chiamare per un simile progetto se non il nostro Hans Theessink ? Per l'occasione Theessink ripercorre la storia del blues "moderno", quello post bellico per intenderci, affiancando a sue composizione originali brani di Bo Diddley, Tom Waits, Hank Williams, Ray Charles, Johnny Cash fino agli Stones della coppia Jagger/Richards. Classici e composizini originali vengono rielaborate e presentate in una versione essernziale dove a farla da padrona sono la voce e la chitarra semiacustica del nostro.

Dutch morality play Elckerlyc was written in the late 15th-century and may well have been the original source for the English play Everyman. In 1911 Hugo von Hofmannsthal adapted Everyman as Jedermann, and since 1920 Jedermann has been performed every year on the steps of the Cathedral in Salzburg as part of the Salzburger Festspiele. The open-air performances have been one of the highlights of the Festival season ever since. Throughout the years many famous German language actors/actresses have been part of Jedermann in Salz burg. Actors playing Jedermann include Attila Hörbiger, Will Quadflieg, Curd Jürgens, Maximilian Schell, Klaus Maria Brandauer, Helmut Lohner, Gert Voss, Peter Simonischek and Nicholas Ofczarek. His famous “mistresses” (Buhlschaft) include Christiane Hörbiger, Senta Berger, Sunnyi Melles, Veronica Ferres and Birgit Minichmayr ...

Based on Everyman and enhanced with dramatic modern adaptations, Jedermann presents God, Death, the Devil and other abstract beings as personifications. The rich Jedermann is faced by unexpected Death, calling him to his judgment. Allowed company on his final journey, he is deserted by his loyal servant, his friends and his money; the figures of Good Works and Faith help him repent and save his soul before he is lowered into his grave.

In 2011 the Austrian Broadcasting Corporation ORF commissioned film director Hannes Rossacher to produce the film “Jedermann Remixed” to commemorate the success-story of 90 years Jedermann phenomenon in Salzburg. Rossacher used archive footage from 9 decades to put together a cultural historic puzzle and create a unique performance of Jedermann that has not been seen in this form before. ORF and Hannes Rossacher asked me to produce the soundtrack for the film and we selected the songs that would fit the themes and scenes.

Besides several Theessink originals we recorded songs by many legendary songwriters: from Bo Diddley to Tom Waits, Hank Williams to Ray Charles, Johnny Cash to Rolling Stones Jagger/Richards. We also struck gold with some tradi tional songs that have been handed down through time.

For me it was a wonderful challenge to create this soundtrack to support the images of the film.

I‘ve tried to reduce the arrangements to the basic essentials; sometimes just one guitar-one voice.

It‘s the nature of film music that only certain passages of the songs are used where the film needs it. Still we recorded the songs in their full length; resulting in “Jedermann remixed” the soundtrack.

James Maddock : Sunrise On Avenue C

Inarrivabile. E' questo il pensiero che continuava a battermi in testa mentre ascoltavo estasiato il concerto di James Maddock all'una e trentacicinque, circa di Cantu'. Dieci anni, sono occorsi dieci anni, prima che il nostro, smaltita la sbornia del successo al debutto, capisse come mettere a disposizione la sua grande vena poetica e musicale, la sua voce emozionante il suo spirito alla causa della Grande Musica. James è tornato, ha girato l'Italia e noi ci siamo imbattuti in lui. Vi posso assicurare che erano anni che non ci capitava nulla del genere. Folk, Rock, Pop raffinatissimo, tutto questo e altro ancora in questa seconda vita di questo cantautore inglese ormai trasferitosi in pianta stabile nella grande mela dove ha trovato la dimensione giusta, e i compagni di viaggio adeguati, per il suo progetto musicale. Un nuovo Boss, un novello Rod Steward, un nuovo James Taylor ? No , semplicemente un nuovo grande cantautore che per pace dei molti altri bravissimi presenti in questo momento sulla scena mondiale, rimane inarrivabile, un gradino sopra tutti gli altri. Cinque Stelle qui non bastano, quella sera a Cantu' ci è andata proprio di lusso......

James Maddock is quietly becoming one of the breakout musical stories of 2010. With the release of the exquisite song cycle, Sunrise on Avenue C, Maddock has re-established himself as one of the most respected singer/songwriters on the scene.

When Columbia Records released Songs from Stamford Hill in 2000 it looked like James Maddock was destined for stardom. All the benchmarks of burgeoning success were there; a top 5 Triple A radio song, prominent placements in TV/Film, inclusion on the first Dawson’s Creek compilation, and extensive touring with the likes of Paula Cole and Train. Although James created a small base of rabid fans, he didn’t achieve the wide recognition he deserved. With his grass roots touring presence around the country and airplay on some of the most influential stations in the country (WXPN, WFUV, Sirius/XM), what seemed meant to be in 2001 is taking shape in the new decade.

Vin Scelsa of WFUV and Sirius/XM puts it this way; “I fell head over heels in love with James Maddock's music around the turn of the century when his band Wood released Songs From Stamford Hill. My heart broke when James seemed to disappear completely from the music scene without a follow-up. From time to time I would search for him on the Internet, to no avail, and play the songs from Wood's only album with a bittersweet ache that matched the mood of the music. Imagine then how thrilled I was to discover at the end of the decade James was living and working right under my nose in New York City, far below the radar, honing his skills, biding his time. Then understand how exhilarated and thoroughly gladdened I became upon hearing his new songs, heartbreakingly beautiful, exquisitely crafted, which pick right up where Stamford Hill left off. James Maddock's talent has a timeless quality he shares with the great songwriters. His music touches the soul. How happy I am to have him back on the radar screen ... the world at large needs artists like this.”

Buddy Miller's The Majestic Silver String

Ricercato guitar-project tra canzone country e tradizione da parte di un grande personaggio accompagnato da Bill Frisell, Marc Ribot e Greg Leisz, Julie Miller, Emmylou Harris, Lee Ann Womack, Patty Griffin, Shawn Colvin, Anne McCrary e Marc Anthony Thompson (Chocolate Genius). CD + DVD contenente un documentario di ventuno minuti e l’esecuzione dal vivo di “Why Baby Why”.

Oltre ad essere una sorta di “padrino” della canzone d’autore di matrice roots tra country e rock, Buddy Miller, è un grande autore e chitarrista di vaglia. In “Majestic Silver Strings”, per non smentire il titolo di tanto progetto, unisce le proprie forze a quelle di alcuni maestri della chitarra quali Bill Frisell, Marc Ribot e Greg Leisz. I quattro ripercorrono e rivedono, come certifica l’autorevole Buscadero, alcune delle più famose canzoni country, in modo decisamente originale ed innovativo. Un guitar sound ricercatissimo in tutto degno degli strumentisti presenti che amano esprimersi nei più diversi ambiti musicali. La parte vocale non è certo da meno grazie alla presenza di Julie Miller, Emmylou Harris, Lee Ann Womack, Patty Griffin, Shawn Colvin, Anne McCrary e Chocolate Genius tra i protagonisti, oltre allo stesso Buddy Miller.

The Majestic Silver Strings album is Buddy’s re-imagination of classic country songs loaded with guitars, atmosphere and attitude. Buddy and the 3 acclaimed guitarists - Bill Frisell, Marc Ribot & Greg Leisz (together they are the Majestic Silver Strings) - push each song into a new cosmos. Guest vocalists include Emmylou Harris, Patty Griffin, Shawn Colvin, Lee Ann Womack, Chocolate Genius and Julie Miller.

Tracklist

Cattle Call (Buddy Miller sings) - No Good Lover (Buddy Miller & Ann McCrary sing) - I Want To Be With You Always (Buddy Miller & Patty Griffin sing) - Barres De La Prison (Marc Ribot sings) - Meds (Lee Ann Womack sings) - Dang Me (Chocolate Genius sings) - Bury Me Not On The Lone Prairie (Marc Ribot sings) - That’s The Way Love Goes (Shawn Colvin sings) - Freight Train (Instrumental) - Why I’m Walkin’ (Emmylou Harris sings) - Why Baby Why (Buddy Miller & Marc Ribot sing) - Return To Me (Lee Ann Womack sings) - God’s Wing’ed Horse (Buddy & Julie Miller sing)

The Majestic Silver Strings: Members

Buddy Miller

Buddy, who has spent much of this year on the road leading Robert Plant’s Band of Joy, recently collaborated with both Plant and Patty Griffin to produce two of the current Grammy® nominated albums. (Robert Plant’s Band Of Joy is nominated in the Best Americana Album category while Patty Griffin’s Downtown Church is nominated in the Best Traditional Gospel Album category.) Buddy currently holds the Americana Music Association honor as Instrumentalist of the Year, while two years ago he swept the awards taking home trophies in almost every category including Album of the Year for Written in Chalk, a collaboration with his wife Julie. Written In Chalk, only the second collaboration from the couple, quickly received high marks among the industry's elite critics including 4 stars in Rolling Stone, Los Angeles Times, Maverick and Mojo.

Bill Frisell

Bill Frisell is one of the most sought-after guitar voices in contemporary music. His prominence as a composer and bandleader has grown steadily over the past 25 years. He has also contributed to the work of such collaborators as Elvis Costello, Paul Motian, Jim Hall, Ginger Baker, Jack Dejohnette, Ron Carter, The Los Angeles Philharmonic, Suzanne Vega, Loudon Wainwright III, Van Dyke Parks, Vic Chesnutt, Buddy Miller, Rickie, Lee Jones, Ron Sexsmith, and numerous others, including Bono, Brian Eno, Jon Hassell and Daniel Lanois on the soundtrack for Wim Wenders’ film Million DollarHotel.

Greg Leisz

Greg Leisz is an American guitarist and multi instrumentalist known particularly for his work on lap and pedal steel guitars. A native of Southern California, he began playing guitar in the fertile garage band scene of the early to mid 60's and was soon drawn into the west coast's emerging synthesis of folk, rock, blues, and country music. In the late 80’s/early 90s Greg played on a number of seminal albums by emerging roots artists and singer / songwriters including Jim Lauderdale, Dave Alvin and kd lang. Since then he has had an extremely prolific career as a studio and touring musician playing on hundreds of albums by a wide variety of artists including Willie Nelson, Joni Mitchell, Emmylou Harris, Beck, Allison Krauss and Robert Plant, John Fogerty, Miranda Lambert, Lucinda Williams and Ray Lamontagne. Greg has also collaborated on a number of projects with fellow Majestic Silver Strings member Bill Frisell. In 2010, he was honored with a Lifetime Achievement for Instrumentalist Award by the Americana Music Association.

Marc Ribot

Marc Ribot, who the New York Times describes as “a deceptively articulate artist who uses inarticulateness as an expressive device,” has released 19 albums under his own name over a 30-year career, exploring everything from the pioneering jazz of Albert Ayler to the Cuban son of Arsenio Rodríguez. Rolling Stone points out that “Guitarist Marc Ribot helped Tom Waits refine a new, weird Americana on 1985's Rain Dogs, and since then he's become the go-to guitar guy for all kinds of roots-music adventurers: Robert Plant and Alison Krauss, Elvis Costello, John Mellencamp.” Additional recording credits include Elton John/Leon Russell’s latest The Union, Solomon Burke, John Lurie, Marianne Faithful, Joe Henry, Allen Toussaint, Marisa Monte, Allen Ginsburg, Trey Anastasio, Madeline Peyroux, Patti Scialfa, Sam Phillips, Akiko Yano, The Black Keys, and many others. Marc works regularly with Grammy® award winning producer T Bone Burnett and NY composer John Zorn. He has also performed on scores such as "Walk The Line (Mangold)," "The Kids Are All Right," and "The Departed" (Scorcese)."

North Mississippi Allstars - Keys To The Kingdom

Abbiamo più volte celebrato la band dei fratelli Cody e Luther Dickinson e questo loro nuovo cd “Keys To The Kingdom” ci fa capira ancora una volta di piu' la grandezza di questa band. . Il disco arriva dopo la scomparsa del grande padre, maestro ed ispiratore, Jim Dickinson e possiamo affermare tranquillamente che è la prima volta che ci capita di assistere ad un album prodotto per e non prodotto da. Celebrazione della vita dopo la morte, di un personaggio di grande carisma che era un autorità del Memphis blues e della musica nera in generale e delle sue radici. Un’esaltazione del passato attraverso il presente dei fratelli Dickinson e del bassista Chris Chew che in ambito blues e dintorni non ha uguali. Che ci troviamo di fronte a qualcosa di speciale è testimonianoto anche dalla caratura degli ospiti ossia Ry Cooder, Mavis Staples, Spooner Oldham, Alvin Youngblood Hart, Gordie Johnson, Jim Spake, Jack Ashford.

In the beginning, a father passed away and a child was born. Luther and Cody Dickinson lost their father, Memphis music legend Jim Dickinson, only months before Luther became one. Jim had always told them, "You need to be playing music together. You are better together than you will ever be apart." Coincidentally, the Dickinson brothers were not together when Jim passed. At that moment, they were both off on their own, Luther with The Black Crowes and Cody with the Hill Country Revue. So in the spring of 2010, the North Mississippi Allstars reformed and went into the Zebra Ranch, the family’s recording studio where they had spent countless hours together with their dad, to create a record that could help them cope with the loss, and, at the same time, rejoice in his honor. The first line of Jim’s self-written eulogy was, “I refuse to celebrate death." Luther, Cody and Chris Chew took heed and aimed to celebrate life instead; and the songs for the new record, Keys To The Kingdom (Songs of the South), came pouring out of their souls.

"As is our family's tradition, we gathered in our homemade studio and recorded," Luther says. "We carried on as we've been taught and dealt the only way we know, by making music. Our dad used to say that production-in-absentia is the highest form of production. The credits read: ‘Produced for Jim Dickinson.’ Keys To The Kingdom is definitely our finest collaboration."

Very close friends of the family joined the band in fellowship to see NMA through this deepest of moments, among them Mavis Staples, Ry Cooder, Spooner Oldham, Alvin Youngblood Hart, Gordie Johnson and Jack Ashford (Motown Funk Brother tambourine player). All had collaborated with Jim and the boys over the years at one point or another and feel a deep kinship with the Dickinson family to this day.

Keys To The Kingdom is a song cycle, a celebratory declaration of life in the face of death as well as a musical interpretation of the Dickinson family's recent experience with the cycle of life, written and recorded honestly, fast and raw. There are moments of rock 'n roll rebellion and sexified blues, but the heart of the record reflects the journey that traverses through the mirrored gates of life and death.

"It's said that anger is the first stage of grief and that's how the album begins - angry," says Luther. As such, the first song, "This A'Way," kicks in with a boogied-up guitar line and quickly introduces the rallying cry of "I hate to be treated this a'way," soon to be followed by the clattering country punk of "Jumpercable Blues," with the screams of "Hey, hey, well, well, well, all y'all can go straight to hell!" It's them against the world, gathering their gumption and keeping one another strong. The family will stay together and it will grow and carry on with its traditions in tact. This is the battle.

From there, the boys explore varying meditations on mortality, often from the perspective of their father as he is preparing to die. The songs grasp the subject matter with fierce honesty yet never become maudlin. From the Mavis Staples ghost-dance gospel soul of "The Meeting," in which one struts and swaggers confidently through the pearly gates with head held high, to the Replacements meets Big Star-inspired rock of "How I Wish My Train Would Come," which speaks of actually desiring to move beyond life's struggles, to "Hear the Hills," which depicts the acceptance and letting go experience of the final moments of a life well lived and loved, we find the boys looking for meaning and answers as they work through their pain. Spooner Oldham, Jim's favorite piano player, lends a hand on these last two songs. Luther chose Oldham to play the "piano from heaven," and blends it beautifully with a recording of Mississippi bugs conversing on a desolate hot summer night. As the song fades, it sounds like a distant country church house somewhere off in the woods.

Luther explains the inspiration: "When we were little children, we lived in a house on a dirt road in between a juke joint and a lake where local churches held baptismal services. I remember hearing the music come through the woods at night and on Sunday mornings."

The one cover on the record is Bob Dylan's "Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again."

"One night, while in the hospital, dad had the great idea that 'Stuck Inside' could be done as a one-chord hill country blues song," Luther shares. "He couldn't talk so he wrote it down on a piece of paper and handed the idea to me. I promised him then that we would do it."

"'Let It Roll,' 'Ol' Cannonball' and 'Ain't None O' Mine' are some of the most hardcore traditional blues originals NMA have ever laid down on tape," says Luther. The former is a new take on a song he wrote and recorded three days after Jim passed away and originally released on a record called Luther Dickinson & The Sons of Mudboy. "Ol' Cannonball is played in the acoustic string band tradition with Alvin Youngblood Hart on vocals and harmonica. "Ain't None O' Mine," drunk on juke-joint, Peavey-amp distortion and reverb, is inspired by Otha Turner's lusty tales of old-time, late-night country courtship and provides a necessary aspect of the cycle of life - sex.

In between these three songs, sits the emotional centerpiece of the record, the ultimate love letter from a son to his lost father, "Ain't No Grave." The song features Jim's old partner in crime Ry Cooder on guitar and is simultaneously heartbreaking and uplifting, gut wrenching and empowering. Says Luther, "I woke up one morning on NMA's bus, and the lyrics to 'Ain't No Grave' came to me as fast I could write them. That night, after the show, I picked up a guitar, opened my lyric book and the melody came to me just as easily. The song is brutally honest and heartfelt."

NMA ends the cycle with two somewhat lighter takes on death. "New Orleans Walkin' Dead" is a humorous zombie-rock take on the notion of resurrection, while "Jellyrollin' All Over Heaven" is in the spirit of a New Orleans funeral procession during which the marching band plays uplifting and joyful music on the return parade from the burying ground. Once again, Oldham plays his angelic piano, and the bugs carry the spirit of the Mississippi night as they have for thousands of years and the record fades to black.

Jim always advised in a very no-nonsense way, "Play every note as if it's your last because one of them will be," and that's just what NMA set out to do on Keys to the Kingdom. The results are powerfully played and deeply visceral as the best blues music is - spiritual without being god fearing, heavy without being depressing.

"In the end," Luther says, "We recorded our best country blues and Mississippi rock 'n roll record yet -- as if our lives depended on it." Ten years after the release of their debut album, Shake Hands with Shorty, Chew sums it up: "This is grown folks music."

On Keys to the Kingdom, some children are born and others become adults; naïve idealism gets squashed by stark realism, yet there is no choice but to move on, and so they do -- the quest for joy, celebration and truth palpable in every note of the mighty NMA sound.



THE BAND

The North Mississippi Allstars were founded in 1996; a product of a special time for modern Mississippi country blues. RL Burnside, Jr. Kimbrough, Otha Turner and their musical families were at their peak; making classic records and touring the world. Brothers Luther and Cody Dickinson soaked up the music of their father, Jim Dickinson, and absorbed the North Mississippi Blues legacy while playing and shaking it down at the juke joints with their blues ancestors. Luther (guitar and vocals) and Cody (drums and vocals) joined up with bassist Chris Chew to form the core of their own band, The North Mississippi Allstars. Through the filter of generations of Mississippi Blues men, the Allstars pioneered their own blues-infused rock and roll.

After touring as an opening act for a variety of artists and honing their chops as a unit, the North Mississippi Allstars issued their debut album, Shake Hands With Shorty in the spring of 2000. Their debut proved to be a success and earned them a Grammy nomination for “Best Contemporary Blues Album”. Bringing their hill country blues-infused rock & roll to stages all over the country and the world (including multiple tours in Europe and Asia), the Allstars quickly gained a loyal fan base. The band gained additional popularity for their work in the Gospel-Blues band The Word, which also featured John Medeski and Pedal Steel player Robert Randolph. By 2005 the North Mississippi Allstars’ had released 4 studio records, 3 of which were Grammy nominated and earned the reputation as one of the most intriguing acts to emerge from the loam of Southern blues and roots rock.

The band released Hernando in early 2008, which represented a return to the blues-rock roots the band started with more than a decade ago. It was also the first release on the trio’s own label, Songs of the South Records. In January 2009, the band finished their retrospective record entitled ‘Do It Like We Used To Do’. The 2 CD/1 DVD package features two discs of music that chronologically highlight the band’s live performances over their first twelve years together, and also includes a full-length documentary DVD on the history of the band. The documentary captures rare live footage, interviews with the guys, and tells the story of a classic American band.

Bruce Cockburn - Small Source Of Comfort

“Small Source Of Comfort” è il primo disco in studio degli ultimi sei anni per questo leggendario songwriter canadese la cui carriera è arrivata alla quarta decade di attività. 14 nuovi brani che riflettono i vari interessi di questo impegnato songwriter. Dei ritorno da un viaggio in Afghanistan, Bruce ha trovato nuove fonti d’ispirazione ed un rinnovato impegno politico-sociale. Oltre che un songwriter di indiscusso valore, come provano 40 anni alla True North, label canadese di musica d’autore per eccellenza, Cockburn è un chitarrista molto considerato dagli addetti ai lavori tanto che è stato paragonato dal New York Times a figure leggendarie quali Andrès Segovia, Django Reinhardt e Bill Frisell.

Tracks :

Iris Of The World /Call Me Rose / Bohemian 3-Step / Radiance / Five Fifty-One /Driving Away / Lois On The Autobahn / Boundless / Called Me Back / Comets Of Kandahar / Each One Lost / Parnassus And Fog / Ancestors / Gifts



With a career that has spanned four decades producing an acclaimed body of work that has sold over 2 million copies worldwide, Bruce Cockburn continues to be revered by fans and fellow musicians alike as one of the most important songwriters of his generation.

Small Source of Comfort is Cockburn's first studio album in six years - a rhythmic
and highly evocative collection of 14 new tracks inspired by his renowned unusual and diverse muse - recent trips to Afghanistan and ponderings on the re-incarnation of Richard Nixon, to road trips and unreturned phone calls. The album boasts some of the best musicians recording today, including violinist
Jenny Scheinman, former Wailin’ Jenny Annabelle Chvostek, and long time collaborators Gary Craig, Jon Dymond and producer Colin Linden.

As both a songwriter and a guitarist, Bruce Cockburn is considered among the world’s best. The New York Times called him a “virtuoso on guitar,” while Acoustic Guitar magazine placed him in the esteemed company of Andrés Segovia, Bill Frisell and Django Reinhardt.

Cockburn’s songs have been covered by such diverse and talented artists as Elbow, Jimmy Buffett, Judy Collins, Anne Murray, Chet Atkins, K.D. Lang, Barenaked Ladies, and the Grateful Dead’s Jerry Garcia

Bocephus King - Willie Dixon God Damn !

Ritorna Jamie Perry, in arte Bocephus King. Un nome che poco o nulla dira' se non agli addetti ai lavori, ma un nome che può essere tranquillamente accostato per poetica e intensita' dei testi ai grandi profeti del rock irrequieto e in cerca di senso : Kurt Cobain e Jim Morrison su tutti. Musica e poesia oscurate dalla pensatezza di una vita non facile, che richiede senso. E su questa ricerca con sonorita' che potremmo accostare ai grandi songwriter oscillando ora tra un novello Van Morrison, ora tra un navigato Cohen, che bisogna ascoltare il nuovo album che testimonia lo stato di grazia di questo eclettico rocker canadese di Vancouver : un album maturo, intenso ed ispirato. Il viaggio è ancora lungo ma ha trovato molti compagni anche nella nostra Italia. Il ragazzo ne ha di esperienza da raccontare, e il talento è immenso. Questo cd non è solo un lavoro discografico, questo cd è un urlo di riscatto, una richesta di senso che vuole essere ascoltata e perchè no corrisposta.

- Bocephus King – Willie Dixon God Damn! Non un tributo al grande del blues, ma un disco rock, bello e variegato, come non speravamo di (ri)scoprire da questo personaggio che alla fine del millennio aveva lasciato tanto sperare. Un talento ritrovato!

Come Bocephus King si descrive :

...........Just As Long As You Arrive....B.King/J.L.Perry......... I've been waiting forever. I can wait forevermore. I'll just sit here and feel it, till my feelings get sore.~~~ The crow tried to tell me, but I didn't understand.. said if I ever felt TRUE love, It could kill me where I stand.~~~ There is no running water. No works of fiction or fact. They tried the Quarter-Back-Sneak.. it got the Quarter-back sacked.~~~ They arrived quite early this morning, without a single, muttered word. No news of my Mother, I hope her wayward mind is cured.~~~ She's been hearing all of them voices. Eating all of them pills. Marrying strong men, who hit her hard but pay the bills.~~~ This station's gloom is familiar. Didn't we meet here before? Singing "Jesus loved the leper, just as Jesus loved the whore."~~~ St. Francis wants to meet you. He's seen you in all of my prayers. His laugh makes me so nervous, but I know how desperately he cares.~~~ It puts Hell in my heart, mama.. to know that I've made you cry.. and now I don't care if you arrive late, love, just as long as you arrive.~~~ There's no advice to be taken. No worn path you can walk. But wait too long for your wishes.... and they'll be outlined in chalk.~~~ There is no promise I can make you. There are no guarantees. But I won't just fight the inevitable, until one of us flees.~~~ I took your warning too lightly. I got the old Monk high. Now there's death on the highway and I forgot how to cry.~~~ The thought of you starts me shaking, but at least I know I'm alive. I don't care if it kills me. Some part of me will survive.~~~ I can't take all that you show me. Don't like some things that I see. But your love is my light, babe. The only light there for me.~~~ I got troubles a plenty. You've got your troubles too. But it's only for your touch, that I could ever be true.~~~ The lying mind: I murdered. His mistresses, I bribed. Now I don't care if you arrive late, love.. just as long as you arrive.~~~ I've been coming through slaughter.... with the reins clenched in my teeth. The horses died in the canyon. My guides, they died in their sleep.~~~ Maybe I died when I met you.. and now I'm only your ghost. Haunting every last raindrop.. on the gold, miraculous Coast.~~~ The seige is relentless. The enemy: un-bowed. Our promise, not broken, is all that we have allowed.~~~ We're not always so wretched... but this place brings it right out. Right out in the open. Out there for all things to doubt.~~~ This ain't the first time I've fallen. But it's the first time it's stuck. Maybe my Sun has stopped setting. Maybe I'm pushing my luck.~~~ I see your eyes everywhere, dear.. gazing from some distant time. Maybe that time we were lovers. Maybe that time you were mine.~~~ They're building on grim speculation. The empty prisons just wait. Tell your boozy-breath-Priest, to keep his hands off your plate.~~~ Ask no more of the doubter. She wants now only to sleep. If it's at all worth going, it's worth going that deep.~~~ Too many nails in the coffin. The lid is on now for good. She only said she could love him, she never said that she would.~~~ You want to be upright and singing, If we're going to do this thing. Stronger than the hollow vows, stronger than the ring.~~~ We've got to be Geronimo-brave, love. Be packed and ready to go. Lest we see only the shadows, of love's holy glow.~~~ If the truth is worth anything, anything more than a dare. then the truth is, I love you and I will always be there.~~~ Be there scars on your soul mama. Be there stars in your eyes. There are always exceptions, Not every sleeping heart lies.~~~ You've always been so strong. You just hide it so well. But I deciphered the message, from the walls of your cell.~~~ You may not like my methods. Their madness steals all your breath. You think this plot may still kill me, but I don't care about death.~~~ I know there are pastures of plenty. Your soul is suspecting it too.. and now it's hard to make your heart keep doing, something it don't want to do.~~~ The truth will tear you wide open. But the trip is surely worth the fall... if any of this whole mad trip.. is worth anything at all.~~~ I've know joy, pain and pleasure. Measured many maidens charms.. but it all lost it's meaning, once I'd danced in your arms.~~~ I know that I wasn't dreaming. At least, I'm not anymore. I'm lost in the truth, baby. I've never been here before.~~~ I saw the whole messy story. It seemed a little contrived. Now I don't care if you arrive late, love.. just as long as you arrive.~~~ Baby, everybody loses. Baby, everybody grieves. There's a place without doubt... it's just so hard to believe.~~~ I've won, lost and wondered, what the whole, ugly game meant. They all live hard in dellusion. For fun they sin and repent.~~~ Their words all are empty. Their lessons rob you of years. They've got apologies for everything When that fails, they have tears.~~~ The world is much bigger, than a few broken hearts. There's a train at the station, and soon my love, it departs.~~~ I got a ticket this morning. O.K., I got two... guess I don't mind being foolish, If I am foolish for you.~~~ The Sun's been up for hours but everyone's still asleep. Except for my wounded neighbor, through the walls I hear her weep.~~~ The night left precious reminders, of how lucky I was to survive. Now I don't care if you arrive late, love, just as long as you arrive.~~~

Blue Rose Novita' : The Statesboro Revue - Paul Thorn

Grazie alla tedesca BlueRose, possiamo apprezzare una delle più belle realtà della scena southern-rock Usa, gli Statesboro Revue, ed il nuovo album della rivelazione cantautorale di Tupelo, Mississippi, Paul Thorn con il suo ultimo album arricchito da un DVD con materiale live ed acustico inedito.

The Statesboro Revue – Different Kind Of Light

- The Statesboro Revue – Different Kind Of Light Band rivelazione di Stewart Mann che sembra in grado di ridefinire il rock and roll, con robuste iniezioni di blues e country, le vere e più autentiche sonorità roots del southern-rock contemporaneo! Per capire l'importanza e l'ambizione del progetto basti pensare che il nome della band è stato ispirato da un brano reso celebre da Willie McTell ripreso in molte esibizioni live dagli Allman Brothers. Quindi racidi blues e sudiste di prima qualita' tanto che del gruppo si è accorto uno dei piu' importanti talent scout d'oltreoceano, quel David Z's (Prince, Buddy Guy, Johnny Lang, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Govt Mule, Billy Idol, Fine Young Cannibals) che può essere considerato il Guru della Southern Music in ogni sua sfacettatura.



The Statesboro Revue was formed in March of 2007 after lead singer/primary songwriter Stewart Mann returned from a stint in Los Angeles. Too long so say he. After 7 years of trying his hand in Atlanta, Nashville, Austin, and Los Angeles, the native south Texan decided it was time to come back home and return to his roots. So he filled up a uhaul and hit the road never to look back, the kind of guy he is. "The past is what brings us to the present and the future, so treat it as if it's taken you somewhere, not as if it were still here." I would venture to guess that little line has multiple meanings behind it.

On to the band name, which comes from a Blind Willie McTell tune that was covered by The Allman Brothers, who just so happen to be Mann's all-time favorite band. The Revue, as opposed to the commonly misused review, derived from a night when Mann found each of his band members entertaining folks as if each were a member of a circus...we'll just leave that up to the imagination.

After recording a debut album as Stewart Mann and the Statesboro Revue, with the help of Jacob Sciba (Govt Mule, Taj Mahal, etc) at none other than Willie Nelson's Pedernales Studios, the band quickly hit the road, and hit it hard. Playing over 250 shows in 2007 alone (well 9 months anyway), they started turning heads everywhere they played. Playing anywhere and for anyone, they quickly earned the reputation as the hardest working, hardest playing band out there.

After selling over 15,000 records with little to no distribution, Mann was bound and determined to make more waves in 2008. After rotating a few band members, Stewart came across lead/rhythm guitar player Todd Laningham, who Mann calls the "most tasteful tunesmith I know." Already intact was drummer Beau Wadley, who lived on Mann's couch for 6 months after "taking an extended break" from Texas A&M, where Mann spent 2 years prior to his Nashville move. Bass player Rob Alton shortly followed, by way of Boston's esteemed Berklee School of Music. Lead guitar/rhythm guitar player Will Knaak is the latest addition to The Statesboro Revue, and it's with open arms. "Will Knaak commands an audience that's for sure, and between the two of us we feel like we can take down the world, in the most modest way possible." No need to clarify, after seeing them I believe it wholeheartedly.

After playing 300 shows in 2008, show 301 led them to what could be their ticket to a successful future. The Chuggin Monkey on 6th street on a Monday night was the setting, and little did the guys know their playing would bring an important someone in from off the streets. Rose Melillo, whose name has been relatively obscure aside from with industry people up until this point, happened to be in town and out and about on a random night. Lucky for Stewart and the guys, she was listening as a hobo ran off with her pizza. Distraught and needing a drink to settle her nerves she says she heard Stewart's voice from across the street. After stopping in for a listen, she left not expecting to see Stewart again. Shortly thereafter, however, she heard the same voice again inside another bar. Stewart had taken a break and jumped up on stage with friend Sam Sliva across the street from where he was playing. Fate one might ask? Stewart began talking to Rose and the rest is history so they say.

After a few amazing showcases Stewart and the boys are in the midst of signing with Rose and good friends, A&R guru Patrick Clifford (RCA, etc), and Grammy-winning mega producer David Z's (Prince, Buddy Guy, Johnny Lang, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Govt Mule, Billy Idol, Fine Young Cannibals, etc) new label venture (yet to be named as of press time).

With their interweaving of rock, blues, and country, Stewart's innate ability to write songs that touch and move the soul, and musicians that can hang with the best of them, The Statesboro Revue are bound and determined to make 2009 their year. With a live show that reminds of a cross between the Rolling Stones, Allman Brothers, Black Crowes, Al Green and Van Morrison; equal parts dynamic and soulful vocals, energetic showmanship, delightful musicianship, moving lyricism and melody for days, mixed in with jam band like grooves, this band is the best of everything that existed in the late 60s early 70s. Not since the Black Crowes in the early 90s has a band come out of the woodworks with such piss and fire and the arsenal to back it up. This is one hell of a band."

Paul Thorn – Pimps And Preachers

Il pubblico internazionale si è accorto di questo nuovo cantore - cantautore nell'anno appena trascorso per le sue innumerevoli apparizioni live che lo hanno portato ad aprire i tours di Bonnie Raitt, Mark Knopfler, e John Prine tra gli altri. Ma per Paul è finalmente arrivato il momento di brillare di luce propria e, che dire, la luce che emana è quasi accecante. Nella sua voce c'è rabbia e smarrimento ma anche una ricerca di redenzione, nel suo stile la chitarra grida e supplica creando emozioni contrastanti. Insomma un poeta dei nostri giorni pronto a regalare al nostro spirito tutta la sua genialita'. Non è il suo album di esordio ma penso possa essere considerato quello della maturita'. Imperdibile.



Among those who value originality, inspiration, eccentricity, and character - as well as talent that hovers somewhere on the outskirts of genius, the story of PAUL THORN is already familiar. Now, Thorn reveals another layer of his fascinating history on the album Pimps & Preachers, addressing that subject on the title cut and in the intriguing "family portrait" he painted for the cover, which highlights his daddy the preacher and his uncle the pimp.

The cover depicts a teeming street scene at the unlikely intersection of Redemption Lane and Turn Out Boulevard. Two figures dominate: a pimp and a preacher, both dressed to the nines beneath broad-brimmed hats, surrounded by hookers, holy rollers and hangers-on, and all on their paths to salvation or perdition. Nearly lost in this tumult is a small boy banging a tambourine branded with the name of Jesus, but backed up against a streetwalker holding a fistful of greenbacks. “That little boy represents me,” says Thorn. “I'm in the church group, but my eyes are looking back to the street where all the sin is going on. It shows me being intrigued by the broad world. That's why I made this my album cover. It describes who I am.”

Born in Tupelo, Mississippi and raised among the same spirits (and some of the actual people) who nurtured a young Elvis generations before, Thorn has rambled down back roads and jumped out of airplanes, worked for years in a furniture factory, battled four-time world champion boxer Roberto Durán on national television, signed with and been dropped by a major label, opened for Bonnie Raitt, Mark Knopfler, and John Prine among many other headliners, and made some of the most emotionally restless yet fully accessible music of our time.

Still, Thorn's story has never been complete. If you follow it back through his songs, at some point near the beginning the mysteries gather like a mist, obscuring the picture and leaving unanswered the question of how he acquired his ability to find brilliance buried in shadows, darkness in daylight, poetry in the mundane, and truth in the brutal beauties of life.

Pimps & Preachers addresses this lingering riddle. On Thorn's ninth album, the answer begins in the title and the cover image, painted by Thorn with the same power, paradoxes, rough edges and passions that animate his writing and performance. Specifically, it takes us to a central theme of Thorn's youth: the pull of polar opposites - one representing the severe ecstasies of fundamental faith and the other, the pleasures stigmatized and yet glamorized by the church.
Similar ambiguities fuel the work of other artists to whom Thorn can be compared, from Tom Waits and Lucinda Williams all the way back to Robert Johnson and Hank Williams. What stands Thorn apart from this august company is how personally this dichotomy guided his formative years. In his seminal albums, particularly his landmark Mission Temple Fireworks Stand, his upbringing as the son of a Church of God pentecostal minister became a matter of record. What hasn't been clear, though, is the parallel impact of his father's brother, who showed up suddenly from California when Thorn was 12 years old. “He was a pimp back in the day,” Thorn says. “I had never met him before, so when he came back to Mississippi he had all this street wisdom and I started hanging around him as well as my father. My father was my mentor, but I learned a lot from my uncle too. Everything I've accomplished has been influenced by the time I spent around these two men.”
Thorn remains close to his father and his uncle today, closer than ever since his uncle has long abandoned his former livelihood. Yet the qualities that so strongly affected Thorn endure in the lyric to the title track, which honors them both; one for teaching him to love, and the other for teaching him to fight. For all the moral questions raised by the choices each man made, Thorn came to accept what they represented as essential and complementary. His embrace of opposites leads to a unity of spirit in Thorn's music, which is brought fully to life by his gift as a narrative writer.


This message rings throughout much of Pimps & Preachers, perhaps most intimately on “I Hope I'm Doing This Right.” The confession implicit in its title is tempered by Thorn's conviction that life is a full-color proposition. “The song says 'Hank Williams was in the darkness when he sang I Saw the Light. I believe there's good in everyone, I hope I'm doing this right',” Thorn reflects. “I was talking to somebody the other day about this and they said, 'As big an alcoholic and a screw-up as Hank Williams was, how did he ever write a song that beautiful?' And I said, 'He was able to write it because he was an alcoholic and a screw-up. Otherwise, he wouldn't have even recognized where the darkness and light were.”
Elsewhere on Pimps & Preachers, Thorn conveys this theme through brief but epic vignettes - parables, almost - in the tradition of his father's Biblical exegeses. “Love Scar” grew from a conversation Thorn had with a woman backstage at London's Royal Albert Hall shortly before he would open for Sting. He noticed that her shoulder bore a tattoo of an eye shedding a tear. When he asked what it meant, her answer was sadder and deeper than he had expected. “She told me about how she met a handsome guy and they had some drinks together,” Thorn recalls. “She had a one-night stand with him and got so distracted by his charm that she went out and got this tattoo because of his opening line when he had started to hit on her: 'If I could be a tear rolling down your cheek and die on your lips, my life would be complete.' Unfortunately, that tattoo is with her forever, even though he was gone the next day.”

Each track recounts its own story while clarifying and reinforcing Thorn's broader vision. The comic yet unsettlingly candid account of romantic opportunity lost too soon on “Nona Lisa,” the immeasurable intensity of love captured in the artfully offhand lyrics of “That's Life” (taken entirely from words spoken to Thorn by his mother), the assurances extended to all who suffer through uncertain times in “Better Days Ahead” - every moment on Pimps & Preachers speaks universally but with a fluency that stems from the earthy blues, haunted old-school country, and stripped-down urgency of the gospel music that surrounded Thorn throughout his Mississippi upbringing.

But Thorn's knack for using snapshots from everyday routine as the elements of this exquisite writing owes entirely to his distinctive abilities and commitment to linking these elements into a profession of mercy and forgiveness - ultimately, the real message of Pimps & Preachers. “Look, there's nothing wrong with songs about holding hands or sitting by the phone and waiting for a girl to call,” he says. “But I wrote songs like that when I was 15. I'm trying now to sing about things that mean something to me, for people who want something real, who not only want forgiveness but are willing to give it. Besides,” he concludes, bringing Pimps & Preachers back home. “If I came back to my dad or my uncle with songs like that now, they'd both kick my ass! So I'm still just trying to follow their lead.”