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David Lindley y Wally Ingram : Twango Bango III |
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The Undercover Review David Lindley records are rare these days. He bordered stardom under his own name as far back as the early 80s with the double whammy of 1981's 'El Rayo Ex' and 1982's 'Win This Record'. Prior to that, in this market at least, he was best known for that marvellous falsetto vocal on Jackson Browne's 'Stay'. As one of the most respected musicians of the 70's you would also have heard him on songs by Linda Ronsdadt, James Taylor, Warren Zevon, Bob Dylan, Rod Stewart or David Crosby. Yes folks, David Lindley is an unsung (or at least seldom sung) musical hero. His music always made you feel good. On that first solo album "Mercury Blues' and his version of 'Twist and Shout' were simply feel good tracks. His records had a subtle wit, but deeper than that GREAT musicianship. So when a new David Lindley record comes along, you have to listen. The wit is still here. You can't help but chuckle to a song titled 'When A Guy Gets Boobs'. The tongue in cheek ode to male middle age spread. "When a guy gets boobs it don't look good / It don't look like no woman / You know a woman looks good like that / but a guy with boobs is just a guy with boobs". I'm sure that for a lot of Dave's old time fans this one is probably a bit too close to reality. That old chestnut 'Shame and Scandal In The Family' gets a great Dave make-over. Taking a reggae slant, and featuring a subtle background toast vocal by Jahfaddah again we entertained by Dave. That's getting too deep too quickly into the record though. For the reason all those artists I mentioned earlier use Lindley on their records, you need look no further than the opening track 'Meatgrinder Blues'. This is Dave, the musician's musician. There is a great vocal there as well from his daughter Rosanne Lindley. (Now here's a lady I'd like to hear an album from). 'Gabrielle' is Spanish flavoured. Together with 'Tokyo Bootlegger Man' you may get a sense of déjà vu for 'Linda Poloma' from Jackson Browne's The Pretender album. (I'll probably get chewed out by Jackson for forever drawing lines back to The Pretender, but hey, that's my take). For the record, 'Tokyo Bootleg Man' was written by Ry Cooder. Look at the song titles. 'Young Man Who Couldn't Hoe Corn' tells you way up front David's inspiration harks back to a time when the sound of 'O Brother Where Art Thou' was still new music. Hey, one of David's first instruments was Banjo so tradition is his template. There's also the occasional word of wisdom. "A man can be a drunk sometimes but a drunk can't be a man" he sings on "A Drunk Can't Be A Man". He goes totally country with the George Jones song 'You Done Me Wrong' but wraps enough originality around anything he plays to own the song for himself. As the album starts with pure musicianship, it ends that way as well. The instrumental 'Meti's Rule' features some beautiful Spanish guitar sounds (he plays an Oud). It has a great Mediterranean feel. Now
for the hard part … this record won't be easy to find. Dave has
put it out himself. I can't even find it listed on Amazon but head
to davidlindley.com,
hit the merchandise button and you can grab it from there. Track Listing Meatgrinder
Blues Label Los Chromosomes (order on line at www.davidlindley.com) |
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