"The Devil can go just straight to Hell! He can go just straight to Hell!!"
Mac Rebennack, born in late 1941, grew up in a home where the voodoo religion was rather important, and he got especially interested in the surrounding music. His dad had a record store where the boy got to know lots of local musicians, things went on, and as a teenager he was a pretty good pianist, and in 1957 he started working as a professional musician, and during the nextcoming years he was on record with, amongst others, Allen Toussaint, Professor Longhair, Lee Allen, and so on. So, in the mature age of 26, after getting the pseudonym Dr John The Night Tripper, and after moving to New Orleans, he finally gets a record of his own out. The musicians are various New Orleans people, and the music is a weird mix of Mardi Gras, Creole, and voodoo. The songs are usually pretty monotonous and repeating, but that’s ok since the greatness of the record isn’t the diversity – it’s the coolness factor! Dark, moody music, emotional female choirs, with the gorgeous growls from the doctor, it’s all so...yeah, cool. Various little guitar or wind-instrument solos adds some melody to the tunes. And a few tunes are lighter in the atmosphere as well. The general feeling is that of a lot of people with masks and stuff dancing around a fire, or something, usually not what you’re used to think of when listening to your Beatles records!
It’s pretty hard to choose highlights or low points, but the opening track, “Gris Gris Gumbo Ya Ya”, with some weird “PA-dooh, PA-dooh” vocals from the night tripper is definitely one of the more tunes, though. The last tune, “I Walk On Guilded Splinters” is another peculiar little tune, and is best listened when it’s dark and you’re sitting is some dark corner of your apartment with a candle as only light source. That’s SCARY. The tune is really dark, with ghostly background vocals and a hook which captures the ear all the time, despite the tune never gets really loud. Uh, I won’t bother getting into the other tunes, go and do it yourself instead! By the way, the album title is pretty funny since "gris" means "pig" in Swedish. That's also cool.
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Most people may have forgotten the spooky, ghastly mardi gras vibes of his earliest recordings, where the mood probably played the biggest role. Perhaps the doctor himself too? I guess it can be quite brainwashing to put out one album with funk after another...anyway, there were some British guys remembering them, ex-Jam and Style Council Paul Weller, Jason Pierce from Spiritualized and Spacemen 3, just as well as the people in Supergrass. And! People from Primal Scream and Portishead are here on one track! Well, Dr John were around when Spiritualized’s universally loved Ladies And Gentlemen, We Are Floating In Space was recorded in 1997, so I guess that’s where it all started. The thing is that it was the Brits who got the doctor to return to the roots, instead of otherwise. And, thank them for that! Think I’m gonna rush and buy some albums by them right now, just because I appreciate what they got Dr John to do so much!
What’s on the album is some psychedelic r&b, mardi gras vibes, Mac’s own little voodoo influences and other stuff. Surprisingly, there’s not too much funk – that can probably be explained with the fact that it’s British musicians used here, and Brits usually don’t have the funky vein some Americans obviously have. That’s all OK, though – we actually don’t need much more funk from the chum. Well, anyway, the songs are sophisticated stuff, and it’s obvious that doctor Mac were serious when doing it. He still has his gorgeous growling voice, which sounds even better now that the guy has some 58 years on his neck!
“Zonata”, the album opener, is a 50-second piano tune, with some pretty great jazzy hooks. “Ki Ya Gris Gris” is more in the same vein as the rest of the album, though, with lots of weird percussion and stuff. There’s “the sound of a snake”, of course with some s-ss-ss-sss sounds there. There’s also a guitar with the John Fogerty sound, and above everything, the doctor’s voice. Pretty cool stuff, but not the best tune on here.
“Voices In My Head” is already better, with some wind instruments being moody in the background, a suiting bass line, and a flute almost ripping off Ian Anderson! There’s some various small extracts from a latercoming break here and there, just to make things exciting – when will the band burst into that line? – and when the guitar finally gets out from being in the background, and the winds and bass join up with it, hey that’s amazing! Wee!
“Hello God” is at first a quite laid-back tune with Mac obviously having a serious talk with God, but the choruses, where a female choir is added and the brass and saxes, drums and guitar, and bass and piano makes up a pretty mighty background, that’s, uh, mighty.
“John Gris” (which means “John Pig” in Swedish, by the way) is pretty much an updated version of “Gris Gris Gumbo Ya Ya” from Gris Gris, and is really moody – everything from the half spoken verses to the choruses with ghostly ooh-oohs and King Crimson-like saxes and lots of percussion and stuff – AND! The “PA-dom, PA-dom” vocal lines from the doctor! Darn cool!
“Party Hellfire” is a rather engaged tune, with some unusually aggressive vocals and riffs. Well, by Dr John’s standards, remember – he ain’t no punker! Anyway, the song is pretty good, but it doesn’t manage to be up to the standard of the best tunes on the album.
“I Don’t Wanna Know” is almost a slick 70’s rock ballad – almost. It’s still Dr John, and not worse than any of the tunes, but, heck...
“Anutha Zone” opens as a Steely Dan tune; with a drum fill and a little electric piano line before the song actually begins. Upbeat choruses heading back to the funky days are mixed with half spoken verses with some regularly returning distorted guitar. Cool.
“I Like Ki Yoka” is a soft, laid-back tune, quite moody and with weird percussion and occasional choirs, everything together being a Gris-Gris rip-off. But, that’s okay – and it’s not the worst thing you could rip off.
“The Olive Tree” is a pretty proggy tune – guitars and percussion makes the background while Dr John tells a little tale with his growling voice – and when some woodwinds are added, mm... and the choruses, with a repeated sax note and a proceeding bass line are pretty mighty too. Pretty awfully cool stuff. Except for a little synth line which comes in towards the end...but allright. I can take that.
“Soulful Warrior” opens with some “Air”/”A Whiter Shade Of Pale”-influenced organs, before it moves over into a funky groove, pretty great choruses. Not as cool as the earlier tune, though.
“The Stroke” has more of that proggy touch, this time within a pretty peculiar little melody line by the guitar, some piano and some other instruments, I suppose. The line that leads to that mentioned proggy line, “The devil he can just go straight to hell..”, is a hell (!) of a thrill, especially when played loud.
The grandiose ending, “Sweet Home New Orleans”, opens with some latino-influenced stuff, especially the winds immediately brings the mind to, duh, Ricky Martin. It’s really cool, though – and there were some people inventing latino before Ricky Martin, weren’t there? Anyhow, this is where some Primal Scream and Portishead buds have joined up, and as you could probably tell from the track name, it’s a funky tune. Some piano bursts here and there, as well as a mighty chorus with smooth but powerful sax lines, some choirs backing up the old doctor, and so, that’s really amazing. And, I can’t help but love Dr John’s voice. Captain Beefheart can go and hang himself, he never managed to bring the same feeling into his music that Dr John managed and still manages to get in there.
As some last words I can add that it’s a really diverse and quintessial album once you think about it. So, think about it! It’s cool, by the way, that some 58-year old bud manages to make a new album with all new compositions and makes it as good as the albums he released when he was 28, and Gris-Gris came out. Hey, Bob Dylan, Paul McCartney, and others – get that!
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