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Words by: Dennis Cook | Images by: Josh Miller
North Mississippi Allstars/Hill Country Revue :: 01.23.09 :: The Independent :: San Francisco, CA
There's little worse than polite blues. The collared beast one encounters on commercial radio or at BBQ & Brew festivals is a far cry from the music birthed by people blinded with lye and beaten with steel cables, folks who barely eked out a miserable existence yet found celebration in a potluck stew, strong homebrew and a few enthusiastic dancing partners. The post-Robert Cray era has lost much of this filthy fingernailed roughness, but sometimes all one needs is a double-barrel reminder to knock them back into the arms of real blues, which can leave one floored and flustered as you powerlessly surrender to the beat, wearing shoe leather off and kissing pretty strangers because they just need some kissin'. If this sounds like testifying it is. After the Hill Country Revue and the North Mississippi Allstars got through with me I was itching to proselytize.
I ambled in unprepared for the spanking awaiting me inside The Independent. The Hill Country Revue (HCR) was already dippin' and divin' hard, all movement and sex and hairy Southern rock grappling with those raw, ugly-beautiful blues I was talking about. It took me a second to recognize "Shake 'Em On Down" but by the time I did the music had its hands on my hips, guiding me into the sticky, dirty groove. Lead singer Daniel Coburn was the spitting image of Ronnie Van Zant at his "Gimme Three Steps" peak, a flexed muscle of a tough white boy in denim with a powerhouse voice and a taking-no-shit-off-nobody attitude. Instantly smitten, it took another moment for it to register that the grappling, mean ass slide guitar was being played by Cody Dickinson, out front instead of behind a drum kit like in the Allstars. His guitar sparring partner, Kirk Smithhart, met him blow-for-blow (and later more than held his own next to Luther Dickinson), and more than once Smithhart recalled the scabbier parts of young Dickey Betts as he poured something smooth into their chunkiness again and again.
Filling the low end was octopus-armed drummer Ed 'Hot' Cleveland and NMA bassist-singer Chris Chew, who took the mic on "Everybody Needs Somebody To Love," doing Solomon Burke proud and tossing out a party favor with guitars that chased one all over like a catcall after a fine piece of rump. Chew was equally fantastic on the slow numbers with both HCR and NMA, his rich pipes really imparting the feeling of "ha-aa-ard times" with beautiful phrasing and true authority. Everything about the Hill Country Revue was appealing in their set, which may seem like a descriptive copout but isn't. There's just so much to enjoy, especially if one likes their blues slathered in Skynyrd gravy and bayou fog. Anyone that's wrong-headedly stayed away because Luther is off with the Robinson Brothers is hereby put on notice - HCR is the real deal. Trust that!
 L. Dickinson :: 01.23 :: San Francisco |
Music, especially blues-based stuff, tends to slant either male or female in general tenor, and North Mississippi Allstars are most assuredly "man music." Beginning in pure trio fashion, one picked up their musk in Luther's three-day-stubble, sandpaper growl and hard stare, not to mention the big piece of wood he's swinging around. Some guitarists caress the sound from their instrument and some seize upon it with teeth shining. Luther is the latter sort, or at least he was this night. I've seen him play nice with the Crowes, wooing with a shuffle and a wink, but there were flames behind his eyes from the second NMA began their super-sized set.
My big revelation about the Allstars from this show – and maybe I'm a fool for missing it earlier – was it's ALL about the syncopation with these guys. Cody and Chew weave and hop like tap dancers who've been following each other's steps for a lifetime. Or maybe it's more like a particularly graceful and powerful running back moving down the field, high knees and tight form slipping past obstacles with ease. However you wanna frame it, they work that bottom end so good that I question your pulse (or soul) if you stay still while they're cranking away. And while NMA can work a festival audience with the best of them, expanding and contracting with real finesse from a trio to massive group gropes, they are really at their best in a place where you can feel the walls sweat and the heat of gesticulating bodies makes you pleasantly woozy. The Independent was perfect, and the engaged, highly creative light application and clean, banging sound system made immersion complete at this show.
"Shake" showed the complete lack of fat on this music. Lean and a might ornery, their blues picked up a trickle or three from Mick Taylor-era Rolling Stones, early '70s John Lee Hooker and other jumped up post-Flower Power interpretations of the tradition. This vibe became more pronounced mid-set when the rest of the Revue hopped up. The interplay between Luther and Smithhart had some creamy twin-guitar Allman-y-ness, and Cody was free to either double up the drums with Cleveland or grab a guitar (and again, wow, just didn't know but probably should have given that Jim Dickinson is his dad). The expanded lineup produced an especially frisky "Bang Bang Lulu" that moved through the crowd in her hot pants and see-thru-shirt, a good time girl producing just that.
They filled the space in such a delightfully rowdy way yet kept something deeper sheltered at their core, some feelings and thoughts not for public consumption that surface in the notes anyway. There's more to all these musicians than meets the eye, and that scrap of mystery is essential to the blues, too. Too much light and the shadows scatter, and what kinda blues do you have without shading and nuance?
Fired up and then some, I hopped in my car and cranked Mississippi Fred McDowell's I Do Not Play No Rock 'n' Roll loud enough to elicit a few hearty "Fuck You's" from apartment windows as I blew through yellows and out onto the freeway home. I'd been re-baptized in the blues by today's Mississippi true believers. I was happy and free and hungry – just like the Revue and Allstars.
Continue reading for more pics of NMA and HCR in San Francisco...
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