Homegrown

The 10 best (plus one)

by Bob Gulla

Foxtrot Zulu

There have been several excellent surprises on the home music front over the past few months. Bands and artists you'd expect to have nothin' left, have come back more dynamic than ever. Take Jack Smith. The Man in Black has been ridin' the painted rockabilly pony for over two decades now, but on his awesome new disc Cruel Red, he and the Rockabilly Planet do an amazing job of sounding like they just bucked a nasty bronco. It's fresh and fired up, with Smith's songwriting as sharp as it has ever been.

Another guy who's been around the block musically is Steve Smith, but damned if he doesn't sound like he could run around that block a few more times. His new Never Say Never is a rhythm and blues blockbuster with solid performances and a horn-ucopia of soul-saturated grooves. And speaking of grooves, we really liked the long-overdue retrospective from Roomful that came out this year on Rounder. Talk about experience. These guys virtually define it. Like the last two, it's another record I'd take for spin anytime, anywhere. They all make the heart swell with pride, these Rhody Rock Hall of Famers.

The upshot of these oldies but goodies? Hell, let's just say it. There's something to be said for experience. The big record companies might not like the over-30s, with their wizened faces and vintage clothes. But I'll take a barrel-aged port over a Beajoulais Nouveau any day. Performers with experience and real records under their belt, for my money, make better, more enjoyable music with greater depth and substance. An experienced songwriter feels more mature, their playing and performances sound truer and more confident, and their records come out sounding better because of it. Sure, there will be some young bucks with a few good ideas and a new approach that will knock the socks off the industry (At the Drive-In, Amen, for example), but these old dogs don't need new tricks, they just make the old ones work better.

So, without further age-isms, a list of the best local rock recordings, in no particular order.

1) Amazing Crowns: Royal (Time Bomb). Both a spit in the face to the litigators who yanked their name away and a scorching drag race down sizzling desert strip, Royal features a band that's had a bunch of unexpected detours but still manages to persevere in a huge way. A Royal triumph.

2) The Sevens: Celtic Groove Brand (Newgrange). Despite an uphill climb as a Celtic band on Yankee turf, the Sevens deliver. That fact is resolutely evident on this astonishingly tasteful journey across the acoustic soundscape of traditional American and Celtic instrumentation, with detours touching upon Cole Porter, Kentucky bluegrass, and world music/ polka.

3) Roomful of Blues: The Blues Will Make You Happy, Too (Rounder). These blues will have you jumpin' in no time as you time-travel back through a time-honored career retrospective.

4) Slugworth: Myriad (self-released). A late arrival, the Slugworth entry is impressive for a number of different reasons. First, they believe entirely in what they do and their sound benefits from the confidence. Second, their performance has the kind of energy lots of rock discs can't muster. It's not scripted either<rather it comes from within in a deeply visceral and gripping way.

5) Erin McKeown: Distillation (Signature Sounds). Perhaps the breakout story of the year, McKeown's new album introduces the nation to a naturally wonderful talent, full of ambition, inspiration, and the self-awareness to go after precisely the kind of audience who will love her.

6) Jack Smith: Cruel Red (Run Wild). When's the last time you heard a rockabilly record that you could listen to repeatedly? 1956? Was Elvis on it? Jack's latest is an honest pleasure from front to back.

7) Steve Smith and the Nakeds: Never Say Never (Still Huge). Down in New Orleans they had the Meters. In Memphis they had Booker T. and the MG's. In Mobile they had the Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section. So in Providence, we have the Nakeds. In the happy tradition of the region, Smitty and the bunch lay it down most righteously on Never Say Never.

8) M-80: Don't Take It Away (self-released). Straight outa the All/ Pennywise/Descendents school of West Coast punk rock comes Kingston's own M-80, an old school clan that isn't some cheesy throwback to a bygone era. Don't Take It Away rocks the house with a fire-breathing combo of aggression and melody, hooks and riffs, shout-out fun, and instrumental muscle.

9) Foxtrot Zulu: Live . . . (Phoenix Rising). When a band is on, the power of their performance can lift an audience off its feet. Good songs sound great, great playing sounds excellent, and the whole thing mingles with adrenaline in creating a spectacular mood. On Live . . ., Foxtrot hit it just right.

10) Lovetrain: Almost Home (Burning Bright). In the capable hands of songwriter Dan Lilley, Lovetrain travels swiftly through a smart set of working-man melodies, falling somewhere between the wise-guy pop of Graham Parker, the Jersey sounds of the Boss, and the roots-rock sound of Cracker. Lilley communicates lyrical ideas clearly while his band turns those ideas into great songs.

10a) The Marlowes: Nuclear Suitcase (Shiny Fly). Another stylin' classic pop disc from John Larson and friends, Nuclear Suitcase features great hooks, potent melodies, and some really strong performances ala solid poppers like the Waterboys' Mike Scott, Rockpile, or Marshall Crenshaw. Providence sure has a tradition of this stuff. Just ask Mark Cutler.

WANDERING EYE. And speaking of tradition, Amazing Crown Jason Kendall writes in after spending eight weeks on the road, six weeks with the Supersuckers and two with Reverend Horton Heat. I'd like to share with you some of Kendall's thoughts on my column of last week. If you didn't read it, it was about the music biz's "two" kinds of success: one financial, in which you succeed by the industry standard of having a hit record, and one personal, where you simply find a way, any way, to play music for a living.

"I believe that there are more than two types of success. We've been doing this for a while with and without label support. Our last label [Time Bomb] went belly up and left us in the lurch with basically no promotion and absolutely no money six months ago. But does this matter in the long run? No, because we were never afraid to risk everything on the road building up our fan-base. In the end that's what saves us. We may be in debt up to our eyeballs and without a penny to our name, but I believe we have found a middle ground of success that's in between the two types that you described."

Hear hear. We knew some gray area existed between the two, and we thank Jason for providing us with a clear-cut example of just where that area lies. Good luck to the band in its quest to maintain that success. Kendall reports that they'll be hitting the road again mid-January, this time with Southern Culture On the Skids.

Sad news from Glass Eye. The band has decided to break up. The good news is that members of the band have spun off to form a new band called Sonnet. They made their debut last Friday at the Century and feature new bandmates Rob Mann and Jim Champlin.

Got wind of new happenings on the reggae scene in the form of the Den Of Inity, an online reggae nightclub featuring Real Video of artists from the New England Reggae Festival. They just added Marcia Griffiths backed by the Wailers. Point and click your way to newenglandreggae.com/LionsDen.htm In related news, Lon E. from the Equal Rites Band and the Mystic Jammers will be releasing his new disc, entitled Marema, shortly. Listen to a sample at newenglandreggae.com/video/real/romancenovel.ram.