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 Strings & Twang
Tony Peyser
Mirror contributing writer
Guitar maestro David Lindley can play every stringed instrument at
McCabe’s Guitar Shop where he performed just last week. He’s worked
with folks like Ry Cooder, Jackson Browne and Warren Zevon. Lindley’s
current performing partner is Wally Ingram whom Lindley swears sounds
like two (or three) percussionists when they’re on stage together.
Twango Bango III is their latest CD of musical shenanigans.
If you’re a man who worries about the boobs in Washington, here’s
something else to fret about: “When A Guy Gets Boobs.” If it were
written several years ago, it have wound up on that Seinfeld episode
with the manziere. There are maybe two people in the world who could
have composed this song and they’re both Lindley. It’s a warning for
fellas that women aren’t looking for competition above the waist. And
it’s got a thick, juicy guitar hook like “On The Road Again” by Canned
Heat. The whacked out and suitably paranoid “Meatgrinder Blues” has
some solid additional vocals done by Lindley’s daughter Rosanne and
trademark sly lines like, “It’s so hard to win, so easy to lose/They
got us playing with a full deck but it’s mostly threes and twos.”
Over the years, many memorable Lindley tracks have often had an
underground comix sensibility. On Twango Bango Deluxe, a lonely man
has a conversation with his bloody broken heart in “This Barstool’s
Reserved For My Heart.” A disgruntled modern guy readies to have
himself turned into ground round in the aforementioned “Meatgrinder
Blues.” In a somewhat more serious vein, Lindley and Ingram give a
reggae beat to the classic “Hesitation Blues” and embrace the
traditional “I Am A Pilgrim” and “Will The Circle Be Unbroken” with a
hip-swaying hula spin via Lindley’s electric Hawaiian guitar. In a
much more serious vein is “A Drunk Can’t Be A Man.” Unadorned and
quietly sobering, it contains this devastatingly simple line: “A man
can be a drunk sometimes/but a drunk can’t be a man.” All Friends Of
Bill should be advised that the A.A. anthem has been recorded.
One track here refers to “Tiki Torches At Twilight,” a beachcomber
ballad which appeared on Lindley’s 1988 CD, Very Greasy. I mention
this because everything he plays is as delicious and exotic as eating
a greasy cheeseburger under Tiki Torches. But go easy on the burger or
you could wind up singing the “When A Guy Gets Boobs” blues.
Joy Lynn White has sung with Lucinda Williams and Dwight Yoakam and
also recorded three well-received major label albums in the 1990s. No
Tikis here but her torchy honky tonk has a palpable spark. On Her Own,
White’s latest CD, is a collection of demos from 1997-2001. If you
ever thought all demos were just half-baked songs, you can stop
feeling that way now. This is as fully baked an album as you could
possibly hope for. The country rocking “Iris Loves Elmer” sounds like
White got The Band as her back-up band. The quietly desperate “Girls
With Apartments In Nashville” is a pedal steel-fueled description of
what it’s liking to be living small and trying to grab the big country
music ring: “Cutting corners, counting quarters/cutting coupons to
keep the roof on …” The melancholy here gives way to powerful love in
“I Turn On The Light.” You’ll be pleasantly surprised to discover the
words “light” and “tight” have upwards of seven syllables. This is
seriously infectious twangy pop that should be blasting out of radios
everywhere. Until it is, go get White’s soulful album, put on track
three and crank it up.
You can get Twango Bango III at www.davidlindley.com for $20 and On
Her Own at Miles Of Music for $13.
* The Goofy Band Name Of The Week is … The Funky Lowlives. |
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