Dickey Betts
Live From The Lone Star Roadhouse New York City 1988
(Wienerwotld)
★★★

FORMER Allman Brothers singer and guitarist Dickey Betts was pursuing a solo career when this highly listenable live set was broadcast on a New York radio station in November 1988.

Betts was no longer such a hot commercial property during the late 1980s but he was still able to deliver the goods with some style in a live setting, and this splendid two-CD set showcases fine performances of quite a few Allmans classics, most notably Jessica, Statesboro Blues and the epic instrumental, In Memory of Elizabeth Reed.

As an added bonus listeners are rewarded with guest appearances from rock luminaries such as Rick Derringer, Cream bassist Jack Bruce and former Rolling Stones’ guitar ace Mick Taylor, with the latter duo joining forces for a masterly revamp of Willie Dixon’s Spoonful.
KEVIN BRYAN

Little Johnny England
Greetings From Grolloo
(Talking Elephant)
★★★

THIS richly rewarding new two-CD set captures the excellent Little Johnny England’s full set at the Grolloo Folk Festival in the Netherlands in March 2003.

The contents of this concert recording were once partially available as a very limited edition album release, but the good people at Talking Elephant have now made the complete show available to the record-buying public for the first time.

Singer and slide guitarist PJ Wright had first cut his teeth as a performer with the Steve Gibbons Band before turning his attention to the delights of folk-rock, perfecting his art with the close collaboration of fine players such as the melodeon-wielding Gareth Turner and demon fiddler Guy Fletcher.

Little Johnny England’s critically acclaimed brand of largely self-penned roots rock may no longer be around to delight audiences but this entertaining package remains to remind discerning punters of their rare prowess as a live act.
KB

Greenslade
At The BBC
(Repertoire)
★★★

THIS splendid vehicle for the talents of keyboards dominated prog-rockers Greenslade draws on a series of top-notch performances which the band recorded for the BBC between 1973 and 1974.

The contents feature two In Concert shows alongside their Old Grey Whistle Test outing in November 1973 and three separate Bob Harris sessions from half a century ago, capturing the quartet’s distinctive and inventive sound at its most melodic and appealing.

Several perennial crowd-pleasers are duplicated in the process, including much loved creations such as Feathered Friends, Pilgrim’s Progress and the title track of their critically acclaimed 1973 album, Bedside Manners Are Extra.

Management difficulties may have prompted this incarnation of the band to give up the ghost a few years later but they were still able to bequeath some excellent work to posterity, and they’re captured in particularly fine fettle here.
KB
 

Benet McLean
Green Park
(Sea Mammal Records)
★★★★

BENET MCLEAN is a remarkable jazz talent. Violinist, pianist and composer, his new album Green Park is full of timbral surprises. All the compositions are his, apart from Bobby Watson’s Fuller Love, and with him are a clutch of young British virtuosi: saxophonist Duncan Eagles, bassist Rio Kai, drummer Zoe Pascal and pianist Liam Dunachie.

As they stomp off into Blue Fingers with Dunachie on organ, McLean's flying strings and Pascal’s thudding drums lead the way with Eagles’ tenor puffing to the finishing line. Lucy stresses McLean’s lucid melodism over Kai’s earthy notes and Red has a winsome touch of the blues affecting all members.

The album excels with the union of sound and solos essayed by McLean and Eagles as if they were brother horns, powerfully expressed in tracks like Mr Bap and the finale, Jo. An unusual and riveting soundscape is this record, imaginatively  and beautifully forged.
CHRIS SEARLE

Sam Newbould
Homing
(ZenneZ Records)
★★★★

YORKSHIRE-BORN and Netherlands-domiciled alto saxophonist Sam Newbould’s album Homing, is a wittily melodic exploration of the notion of “home,” thematically centred around his adoption of a Polish homing pigeon.

All the compositions are his, and he gets powerful support from an internationalist band of fellow saxophonist Bernard van Rossum, pianist Xavi Torres, bassist Jort Terwijn and drummer Guy Salamon.

In Below the Elbow he jauntily improvises alongside Torres’s dancing keys, in the album title tune the two saxophones converse excitedly, and Little Boy Ghost seemingly and movingly explores the saddening soul of homelessness felt by a displaced child.

Homing is an album full of musical narrative in which listeners must play their full part in conceiving and telling its stories. Yet it stands in the tradition too, with Monk’s Twinkle Tinkle rewrought to become Newbould’s Twinkle Twinkle, a rehomed Englishman’s tale of a novel version of a classic theme.
CS

Sofia Jernberg/Alexander Hawkins
Musho
(Intakt Records)
★★★★★

HOW gloriously syncretic is jazz! In this album of drama, lamentation, resistance and powerful artistry, Oxford-born pianist Alexander Hawkins and Ethiopia-born and Sweden-bred vocalist Sofia Jernberg play and sing with extraordinary cosmopolitanism, tunes and songs from Ethiopia, Armenia, Tudor England and medieval Sweden.

Hawkins, traveller on a profound musical journey with the great Cape Town drummer Louis Moholo-Moholo as well as an ex-member of Mulatu Astatke’s Ethio-jazz Orchestra, plays with a brotherly companionship as Jernberg’s surging, saddening, rampaging and always moving voice sings of vibrant life and love.

“Musho” is an Amharic word for a sad or mourning song, yet a key track is Adwa, celebrating the Ethiopian victory over invading Italian imperial forces in 1896.

How cogently and joyously does Sofia sing and Hawkins stride out his notes, bristling with oral defiance and pianistic solidarity. A marvellous record this, for all times, all seasons.
CS

50th Anniversary: Walking To New Orleans
Various
(Jasmine)
★★★★★

PENNED by blues music authority John Broven’s Walking To New Orleans, a history of R&B in the Crescent City, sparked a renewed interest in the music of Fats Domino, Irma Thomas, Lee Dorsey, Clarence “Frogman” Henry and Smiley Lewis.

Record companies scoured their vaults for recordings by New Orleans artists to reissue on compilation albums while John Peel and other serious music DJs began spinning records not just by the stars but by artists with exotic names like Professor Longhair, Papa Lightfoot, Archibald, Ernie K-Doe and Prince La La.

This 65-track double-CD set (an aural accompaniment to Broven’s book) has a detailed booklet and features sides from the 1940s to the early 1960s including Fats’ title track, Amos Milburn’s Chicken Shack Boogie, and blistering rock & roll including Jerry Byrne’s Lights Out and Roy Montrell’s Mellow Saxophone. Unmissable.
TONY BURKE

This Is Goldwax: 1964-1968
Various
(Kent)
★★★★

1960s Memphis soul was dominated by Stax and the smaller Hi Records. But in the queue was Goldwax Records owned by Quinten Claunch and Doc Russell.

Goldwax’s headline star was James Carr, (described as the best soul singer in the world — tell that to Otis Redding!) who waxed the now classic Dark End Of The Street in 1967.

Goldwax was also home to singers like Spencer Wiggins and OV Wright as well as lesser lights like Wee Willie Walker, Percy Milem, The Ovations songwriter George Jackson, and musicians such as  Gene “Bowlegs” Miller.

Sadly, Carr suffered from a bipolar condition resulting in erratic behaviour which hit the promotion of the label such as Stax was able do with touring revues of their stars.

But it’s a wonderful double-vinyl set, with historical notes and a must for 1960s soul fans.
TB

Jack Bruce
Songs For A Tailor Remastered Edition
(Esoteric)
★★★★★

BRUCE’S debut solo set from 1969 following the demise of Cream, fans expecting an album of powerhouse blues rock were taken aback as Jack drew on his extensive knowledge of jazz, folk and classical music.

Joined by producer Felix Pappalardi plus jazz and rock musicians including Jon Hiseman, Chris Spedding, Dick Heckstall Smith and George Harrison, the album made number six in Britain and 55 in the US.

This four-disc box features two audio CDs of the album including demos, outtakes, different mixes plus two Blu-Ray discs featuring the album in audio 5.1 surround sound and stereo mixes and a TV documentary directed by Tony Palmer.

Tracks include classics like Clearout, Theme From An Imaginary Western and Rope Ladder To The Moon. A wonderful tribute to one of Scotland’s national treasures.
TB