| CD REVIEW |
| Orville Johnson is a long-time guitarist-vocalist-composer specializing in bottle-neck blues and lap-style playing. Although he is, in fact, a multi-instrumentalist, he favours the resophonic sound of the dobro. He is also one of many instructors at IGS (International Guitar Seminars), an organization organization which has chapters in New York and Seattle. Orville is currently based in Seattle, but originally hails from St. Louis, Missouri, where he was a minstrel on the Mississippi River, aboard the Julia Belle Swain steamboat. His d�but CD, Slide and Joy, encompassing various musical factions of blues music, is followed up here with a "back to the roots" perspective on blues music. He is accompanied by Brian Williams (from Brutus & The Bullies?) on bass, Mark Graham on harmonica and clarinet, Will Dowd on percussion, who also contributes to Mark's CD, Inner Life, and Kim Scanlon and Jo Miller on fabulous harmony back-up vocals. Orville Johnson has also enlisted the services of Barney McClure, a prolific jazz pianist/B3 player/producer who has released five jazz CDs, has performed globally in various media pockets and founded the Port Townsend (Washington) Blues Festival while employed as its mayor! As if that weren't enough, he has been a state politician, authored a book on improvisation, entitled There's No Such Thing as a Mistake and raised, along with his wife, four children. Barney also played with raunchy saxophonist-vocalist Eddie "Cleanhead" Vinson, as did Jane Vasey, the original keyboardist from Canada's Downchild Blues Band. Both Eddie and Jane are long dead and buried but will never be forgotten. Anyway, back to the music at hand! Orville has a winning combination of fast fingers and a dynamic vocal range that Madonna would kill for! It's not hard to see how Ricki Lee Jones and Elvis Presley were influenced by Willie Dixon's less popularized tunes like "Good Understanding", which also serves as a precursor to Mr. Johnson's own comprehensive understanding of the blues, as evidenced on his own originals, "Rainy City Blues" (which track I'm certain the late Dave Conant would have loved to cover on slide guitar!) and "Blueprint for the Blues". Orville's romantic Creole waltz, "My Sweet Octoroon" got the better of my curiosity, so, upon looking up what an "octoroon" was, I learned that it is a person of one-eighth black ancestry, as opposed to a quadroon, who is one-quarter black. The origin of the words is apparently Spanish. I've always admired musicians who take the time to listen to other players, whether they consciously choose to interpret or incorporate these other styles into their own or not. It shows a certain humility and appreciation for music in general that can't help but inspire one's own creations. The majority of the tracks are laid-back, but not morose, and speak of human relationships, spirituality and the cycle of life and death that we all have to experience and endure. Songs like Fred Neil's "The Other Side of Life", Doc Watson and Clarence Ashley's "God's Gonna Ease My Troublin' Mind", Wilson Pickett and Solomon Burke's "If You Need Me" (which actually sounded more to me like a Willie Dixon/Sam Cooke composition), and the "peerless" Rev. Gary Davis's "Death Don't Have No Mercy" serve as examples. Son House is also represented, a capella, with rhythmic clapping, on the opening spiritual, "Grinnin' Faces", addressing the value of a good friendship, one already formed, or the potential for new ones. There's also a mid-tempo honky-tonkin' boogie ("Tears Come Rollin' Down") by Henry Townsend, which is similar in style to anything written by Lightnin' Hopkins, and that's followed by the slow groovin' croon of "Tell Ol' Bill", a traditional guitar blues whose arrangement here is partially attributed to Peoria bluegrass musician Bob Applegate (Applegate & Co.), from Orville's steamboat days. Eric Clapton and Bruce Cockburn have often adopted this style of finger picking in their recordings as well, but for some truly excellent fretwork, check out �Tired Chicken Blues�, a tribute to Gus Cannon�s Jug Stompers, who inspired Orville to form his own jug band, Strangers with Candy. There�s even a bit of comic relief on the CD, with �The Last Meal�, about a soon-to-be-executed convict ordering his final (and impossible) repast - upbeat and hilarious! Stamp this CD, "100% Pure Virgin Blues"! |
| BLUEPRINT FOR THE BLUES - ORVILLE JOHNSON |
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