All Eyes Out For You

Treme (Sundays, 9pm CDT on HBO)

Don't know if you've caught the new David Simon (The Wire) series on HBO, but Treme is an interesting look at the citizens of New Orleans who struggled during the months after Hurricane Katrina.  A huge part of the show focuses attention on the struggling local musicians who try to get back on their feet along with the city.

Patrick Jarenwattananon and Josh Jackson have had an ongoing post-show email exchange after each episode over at NPR, including the most recent Episode Three: Playing For That Money.  It's an interesting chat, and I've really been enjoying the show (though it's hard to tell where it's headed).

For reasons that are pretty obvious, this past week's episode reminded me of this short photo essay I shot during a 2008 trip to New Orleans.

BTW, Episode Two featured Allen Toussaint and Elvis Costello recreating the recording of River In Reverse, which was indeed partially recorded in New Orleans very shortly after Katrina.  Alas, it's totally unrealistic because producer Joe Henry is nowhere to be seen.

Joe Henry to produce new Over The Rhine album!

You know how much I love it when one of my favorite bands hooks up with my favorite producer.

Therefore, it's very exciting news to me that Over The Rhine will begin recording at Joe Henry's South Pasadena studio on May 17.  Even better, the band is funding this recording with donations from fans.  Everything from a $15 CD version to a $100 deluxe edition are available for purchase now.  The $50 and $100 levels will grant you access to downloads of nine demos of songs that will be recorded in a few weeks.  There will be some fundraising shows in June and December as well.

This is a great pairing of artist and producer.  OtR's most recent studio album The Trumpet Child certainly had some sonic similarities to some of JH's own solo work as well as to some of his production work.  This album has surely just shot to the top of my most-anticipated records of (hopefully) 2010.

(Many thanks to Josh Hurst for the heads-up.)

UPDATE:  Linford has much to say about the new record.  Did I mention how excited I am?

Best Albums of 2009: #1 Joe Henry - 'Blood From Stars'

Call this record "the album that inspired a blog."

Joe Henry has become the rarest of artists, a singer-songwriter who is able to filter his music through a number of elliptical perspectives but still able to maintain a rather direct connection to the listener.  I would say he turned this corner with Civilians, which was much lighter on the filters than his previous two excellent albums.  Blood From Stars manages the rather neat trick of combining the straightforward lyrical approach of Civilians with the dense musicality of, say, Tiny Voices.

That's not to say that I can tell you exactly what Blood From Stars is about.  It's about God, no doubt, but Henry is vague about which God or whose.  Like all of his records, it definitely concerns love and matters of the heart (this might be Henry's most abashedly romantic album).  He has mentioned that the classic French film Children Of Paradise was recommended viewing for the studio musicians, but even if you've seen the movie, it probably won't answer the question for you.  That's just it -- Blood From Stars is able to speak to your heart without you necessarily knowing what it's saying explicitly.  That's probably the closest definition of great art that I can imagine.

And about those musicians... Henry's records are also defined by the stellar and rotating cast of brilliant musicians who appear on his albums.  Though regulars Jay Bellerose, David Piltch and Patrick Warren are the backbone of the album, the stars of Blood are probably guitarist Marc Ribot and saxophonist (and Henry's son) Levon Henry.  Most of these musicians are Henry's closest collaborators (working with him on his production work as well), but each of his last four albums is entirely distinctive and sounds nothing like a retread of his previous work.

Henry recently received Grammy nominations for his production work (on the recent Allen Toussaint and Ramblin' Jack Elliott albums), but his own albums will probably continue to be overlooked as long as they defy any obvious categorization.  Though jazz is obviously an influence, his records are nothing like jazz.  Though certainly a singer-songwriter, he transcends the simplicity of folk music (though he might deny that any such transcendence is possible).  It doesn't really matter - Blood From Stars is probably the only album on my Best of 2009 list that I would insist you simply must hear for yourself.

O, Brother, Where Art Thou (Been)?

Well, it would be understatement to say that I've left any remnants of loyal readers pretty high and dry over the last month.  My Best Albums of 2009 list remains incomplete, pending No. 1 and No. 2 (though any regular readers of this blog probably already know what they are).

So what's been going on?  Well, the quick answer is that I somehow found myself sucked into a vortex of film, which has occupied a great deal of my interest lately.  This blog doesn't seem quite the forum for it, so I decided to crank up a new film blog to deposit those thoughts.  By all means, please check it out if you're so inclined (the longest entry so far is my impression of Frederico Fellini's La Dolce Vita and 8 1/2).  I've been traveling the past couple of weeks, and I'm pretty behind on some new DVD releases.  But hopefully, I'll be catching up over the next week or so.

However, what really happened, I think, is that the last quarter of 2009 just really left me high and dry musically.  Looking back, I believe Joe Henry's Blood From Stars (released in August and in my hands much earlier than than) was the last album that really grabbed hold of me.  That's an awfully long time to go without a record that gets under your skin.  Quite frankly, my attention has just drifted away from the world of music.

This year is already more encouraging.  Spoon's new record is wonderful, a real affirmation that they simply are one of the best studio bands out there.  Transference won't be the crossover hit that Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga was, but it continues Britt Daniel & Co.'s streak of daring, fascinating albums.

Even more wonderful is Patty Griffin's just-released semi-gospel record Downtown Church, produced by Buddy Miller.  There's little to say about it except that Griffin has become just about my favorite singer on the planet, and the material on the album runs a gamut of styles.  I call it "semi-gospel" because it would be almost easy to overlook that thematic element of the album and simply be washed away with the gorgeous performances.  When I think about what kind of reaction I was missing with much of the music I heard in the back half of '09, THIS is what I'm thinking about.

I'll perhaps have much more to say about Downtown Church soon, but don't forget that Allison Moorer's new album Crows is due in less than two weeks (Feb. 9), and Drive-By Truckers' The Big To-Do is due on March 16.

Best Albums of 2009: #5 Allen Toussaint - 'The Bright Mississippi'

To call Allen Toussaint a "jazz" artist is to severely underestimate what makes Toussaint such a treasure.  Very little on his resume - as a producer, performer, arranger or songwriter - would pigeonhole him as such, but a New Orleans-flavored instrumental effort is bound to get stuck with the jazz label.  But if jazz is but one influence that courses through The Bright Mississippi, it is joined by elements of blues and pop standards and, most importantly, an adherence to melody over technique at every possible turn.

Joe Henry has plenty of "legacy artists" under his belt as a producer, but never before has he helped an artist redefine his own legacy to quite this extent.  One or two critics even complained that giving Toussaint only one vocal turn and ignoring his own songbook amounted to a missed opportunity.  But how can one feel that way when the music on display is so full of vigor and spirit?  It is to Toussaint's great credit that he felt at ease allowing his first solo effort in some time to be such an unexpected turn.  Of course, that is no doubt the result of an artist who is equally at ease with his own legacy and not burdened by the weight of making a career-defining statement with one record.

Hopefully, what that means is that we'll continue to hear more Allen Toussaint albums for years to come and that each of those will be at least half as revelatory as The Bright Mississippi.

Joe Henry Week In Review

I've got a pretty comprehensive roundup of this week's press for Joe Henry's new album Blood From Stars over at my Joe Henry blog.

What, you haven't checked out the blog yet?  More importantly, you don't have Blood From Stars yet??  What are you waiting for?

Joe Henry's 'Blood From Stars' available NOW from Amazon for $3.99!!

You can buy Joe Henry's fantastic new album Blood From Stars on Amazon MP3 -- a day early and for only $3.99.  Of course, I suggest snagging a physical copy (Henry's liner notes are always indispensable), but this is a great deal.

UPDATE:  No longer on sale, but still a bargain at $8.99.  Would still be a bargain at $99.99.

The Hurst Review: 'Blood From Stars'

Josh fires the first shot across the bow with - no surprise here - a rave review of Joe Henry's upcoming album Blood From Stars.  The album is due next Tuesday, August 18.

You can also read a very nice interview with Henry over at My Old Kentucky Blog.

UPDATE:  Don't take Josh's word - or mine - for it -- head over to NPR and listen to Blood From Stars for yourself!

Jeffrey Overstreet gushes over Joe Henry

J.O. brings us early word that Joe Henry's Blood With Stars is, indeed, fantastic.  No surprise there.

I guess this is as good a time as any to let you in a little project I've dreamed up.  It's a blog dedicated to Joe Henry (or, more accurately, the "world" of Joe Henry).  It will have the usual links and news, but I hope also to spend more time posting original thoughts and revisiting Henry's work.  I'll have a bit more to say in my first post, but you can preview it at this link:

http://houstonramblings.typepad.com/joehenry/

And I might also mention that I received a copy of Blood From Stars earlier in the week, and I completely agree with Overstreet's assessment.  The record will be out August 18 on Anti- Records.

Joe Henry to produce Mose Allison

According to the Detroit Metro Times.  Gosh, Henry's new record isn't even on shelves (due Aug. 18), and he's back in the producing chair.