Second Crossing
During the late 1950s and early ’60s, the giants of Nashville R&B recorded for a family of labels—including Calvert, Cherokee, Poncello, and Spar—co-owned and operated by local producer, songwriter, and occasional performer Ted Jarrett. Chief among these was the Champion imprint, which in 1959 played host to everyone from The Fairfield Four to blues vocalist Christine Kittrell. If you’ve heard the outstanding Ace Records import Across the Tracks: Nashville R&B and Rock ’n’ Roll, you’ve at least heard a few representative tracks by outstanding Champion artists such as Larry Birdsong and Earl Gaines. Their singles combined polished vocals and smoothly crafted tunes with a raw, manic instrumental sound that hasn’t lost any of its punch over the past four decades.
Since the release of Across the Tracks in Europe last year, interest in Champion and its related labels has intensified overseas—so much so that the label and its artists will be spotlighted with a special show at the Utrecht Blues Estafette, a renowned blues/R&B festival in Holland, on Nov. 22. Producer Jarrett and vocalists Earl Gaines and Herbert Hunter are among the Nashville talent on tap for the show, along with famed Music City blues guitarist Johnny Jones, who backed many of the early Champion artists as guitarist for the Jimmy Beck Orchestra.
In case you can’t afford a ticket to the Netherlands, the artists have agreed to perform a Champion Records reunion show at 3rd & Lindsley Sunday night. The show will be filmed for an upcoming PBS documentary by Peter Kimball, who wrote and produced the acclaimed Emmylou Harris special Building the Wrecking Ball. The mighty Roscoe Shelton will be on hand, as will Sonny Tyler and vocalist Al Garner, who recorded a couple of singles under the name “Murfreesboro.” One special guest tentatively scheduled to perform is R&B great Gene Allison, a Cherokee hitmaker whose recording of Jarrett’s “You Can Make It If You Try” was later covered by the Rolling Stones. Allison rarely appears in public these days, and the opportunity to catch him shouldn’t be missed.
“You Can Make It If You Try” is among the featured tracks on the just-released Across the Tracks Vol. 2, Ace Records’ sequel to last year’s successful import. Allison, Jarrett, Murfreesboro, Christine Kitrell, The Fairfield Four, Earl Gaines, and Larry Birdsong are all represented, as are more obscure groups such as the Kinglets and Charles Walker & the Daffodils. Along with some hot, hot R&B, the disc features liner notes by occasional Scene contributor Daniel Cooper. Ace imports are notoriously difficult to get at local record stores—fittingly, since Nashville R&B seems to be appreciated everywhere but Nashville. If you’re interested in tracking down a copy, try looking up Ace’s Web site online at http://www.acerecords.co.uk/.
As one club leaves the District, another opens to take its place. This week marks the grand opening of Somethin’ Live, which opens in one of the coolest unused spaces in town, the old Captain’s Table nightspot in Printer’s Alley. Described by spokesperson Racheal Green as “a jazz/R&B/Top 40/dance venue,” Somethin’ Live is the brainchild of Miami Dolphins cornerback Corey Harris, a former Vanderbilt player and current Nashville resident with a keen interest in the music industry. The venue has two rooms: a plush 300-seat auditorium for big touring acts, and a smaller side stage for comedians and bands.
Tuesday night brings the “Rhythm of Love” tour to Nashville, an R&B revue toplined by Will Downing, Regina Belle, and Boney Jones. There will be two shows at 8 and 10 p.m., and tickets are $29 for the first show and $25 for the second. On Nov. 21, the club initiates its series of “JazzNet” evenings, intended to promote networking between jazz musicians and fans. Coming attractions include jazz saxophonist Jonathan Butler Nov. 27 and Ronnie Laws Dec. 5-6. For more information, call 615-254-5483.
The latest in Sri Ganesha Temple’s popular series of Indian classical music concerts takes place Sunday afternoon in the Temple Auditorium at 521 Old Hickory Blvd. in Bellevue. The featured performer is saxophonist Kadri Gopalnath, who is said to have introduced the saxophone to South Indian classical music 20 years ago. He will be joined by A. Kanyakumari on violin and Guruvayoor Durai on the mridangam. Tickets are $20, $10, and $5 for students; the concert begins at 2 p.m. For more information, call 615-352-0519.—Jim Ridley
Spawned by the same Northwestern femme-rock scene that gave us the sublime Team Dresch and the rollicking Sleater-Kinney, The Need is at once more oblique and more straightforward than their contemporary sisters. Their musical roots are in the avant-guitar grooves of Gang of Four and Pylon rather than the brash punk and post-punk of their colleagues. Drummer Rachel Carns keeps a syncopated beat and pounds on a cheesy organ, while guitarist Radio Sloan runs skittery little half-riffs around her own supple bass playing—creating a sound that’s part garage and part science lab. The lyrics, cowritten by both members, consist of brutally raw, free verse poetry about death, medicine, and rough lesbian sex; the duo sings the lines in a spiteful trill.
Carns comes to The Need after several years in Olympia, Wash., combo Kicking Giant, who put on a very exciting show at Lucy’s a couple of years ago. If her skinwork at that gig is any indication, The Need should be as gripping live as they are on their eponymous EP, released by Chainsaw Records. Whether or not you catch their show at Lucy’s this Friday night, the record is highly recommended—it’s a concise burst of lusty passion and thoughtfully forceful composition, on a par with anything that the maturing grrrl-y genre has produced.—Noel Murray
British musician and songwriter Julian Dawson has been earning some serious Americana credibility in recent years—Vince Gill, Steve Forbert, Lucinda Williams, Duane Eddy, and Garry Tallent are some of the better-known performers who’ve appeared on his albums. In fact, he seems to prefer working with people on this side of the Atlantic. “People’s attitudes in the States are so much more open than in England,” he says. “You can strike up relationships just based on the fact that you get on with people. It’s not some big record-company phone-call deal; you just meet people, hit it off, and you can work.”
“Can a Brit be Americana? That’s the question,” jokes Dawson, who was born on July 4, 1954. “A huge percentage of what turned me on about music, and still does, comes out of the States.” He’s not just paying lip-service when he says that: Dawson has even cowritten with legendary R&B songwriter Dan Penn, who sings on two of his albums, including the recent Move Over Darling (Compass). “It’s more of a thrill for me to work with Dan than it would be, say, if Oasis called up.”
Perhaps no American artist has captured Dawson’s imagination more than country pioneer Charlie Louvin, with whom Dawson appears at the Bluebird Cafe Nov. 19. Louvin and his late brother Ira were, like the Delmore Brothers before and the Everly Brothers after, hugely influential on harmony vocal styles in country and popular music. Nine years ago, Dawson met Louvin when he asked to open a bill for the legendary country singer at the Mean Fiddler in London. Louvin then invited Dawson to play harmonica for him at a festival in Cambridge, and it was Louvin who, a few years ago, encouraged Dawson to pursue Nashville as a professional outlet.
It’s ironic, then, that Dawson is responsible for getting Louvin hooked up with a label based in Austin, Texas. “Charlie was saying he didn’t have a record deal, which I thought was some kind of crime, really.” Dawson convinced Watermelon Records to release The Longest Train, a delightful mix of Louvins tunes, Dawson tunes, and an absolutely heartbreaking rendition of the late Sandy Denny’s “Who Knows Where the Time Goes?”
Expect to hear some of these songs when Dawson plays the Bluebird with Louvin, Jim Lauderdale, and Gene Pistilli this coming Wednesday night. He’ll play the club a week and a half later with Bill Lloyd, Duane Jarvis, and Greg Trooper on Nov. 29.—Shelton Clark
Elliptical dispatches: James Talley, the acclaimed 1970s folksinger who was profiled so memorably in Peter Guralnick’s Lost Highway, makes a rare Nashville club appearance at the Sutler this coming Wednesday night. Talley, who performed at Jimmy Carter’s inauguration but abandoned his career in the 1980s to become a successful Nashville Realtor, hasn’t performed locally since a Sutler Americana show in 1995....
A few weeks back, we mentioned that singer Aynee Osborn would have a standing weekly gig through November at the 16th Avenue Cafe. Osborn’s still here, but the 16th Avenue Cafe isn’t: The listening room near the corner of Music Row and Demonbreun St. has closed to make way for the new location of Off Broadway Shoe Warehouse. Watch for Osborn at upcoming editions of Billy Block’s Western Beat Roots Revival....
With the offices of Musician magazine due to relocate to Nashville, what better time to enter the 1998 Musician Magazine Best Unsigned Band Competition, open every year to deserving acts around the country? Twelve winners will be selected by a panel of judges that includes Joe Perry, Ani DiFranco, Moby, Keb’ Mo’, and Everclear’s Art Alexakis, and the entries will be gathered on the magazine’s annual Best of the BUBs CD compilation. The grand-prize winner will receive a gear package worth more than $10,000, but the deadline is Dec. 31. For more information, call 1-888-SONGS98....
If you put off entering until the last minute, cut it out: The final submission deadline for Austin’s South by Southwest ’98 festival is Saturday. Call 512-467-7979 for more info....
