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12/30/2005
Tim McAllister
What is this? Acoustic blues? Ragtime? Americana? New Orleans voodoo? Well… Yes.
Mary Flower is up front on her guitar, singing with a big grin on her face. There’s an string bass right behind her. Trumpets and trombones marching through the room belowing out their thoughts. A clarinet is buzzing like a song bird outside the window. There’s a honky tonk piano over against the back wall. An accordian is sitting there on an chair in the corner. Great musicianship abounds and things get a bit crazy at times giving that insane boudville feel of Tom Waits Small Change.
The songs cook right along and I was half way through the record before I noticed that there were no drums. Well, not entirely true, Kevin O’Day plays the snare drum on New Orleans Hop Scop Blues. Highlights include Mary’s slide work on Raise The Devil, her rolling, rollicking guitar work on Papa’s On The Housetop, Jon Cleary’s organ solo in Last Kind Word, the insanely fun Brother Can You Spare A Dime, and the piano work on Nobody’s Fault But Mine (which by the way is nothing like the Zeppelin version I first fell in love with).
Like the memory of a summer picnic with the family. It was a sunny day, there was a cool breeze blowing, everyone had fun and uncle Frank behaved himself, well… mostly. This album puts a smile on your face.