WIN A CD!Gospel: NorthernBlues Gospel Allstars and Blues Rock: John & the Sisters

A couple of years ago NorthernBlues Music released an album called Saved! by the NorthernBlues Gospel Allstars. The Allstars bring together many Canadian Gospel artists, collaborating on a great collection of traditional Gospel songs and originals done in a style that confirms the great connection between Gospel and the blues.

The Allstars brings together John Finley, Hiram Joseph, Danny Brooks, and Amoy Levy, incredible voices all. Working with a room full of musicians and background chorus, this stands out from many Gospel albums recently coming to my attention. The musicianship is outstanding, the production and arrangements give it a natural, live feel, and the lead vocalists sound as if they are within the entire ensemble rather than as on other Gospel albums where the lead vocalist sounds like he/she is singing over a vocal track.

Danny Brooks offers the lead on his own shuffling “Still Standing Tall,” which really does make me want to testify. Amoy Levy belts the lead on “24/7/365,” another Brooks original said to be inspired by Ry Cooder’s “Jesus on the Mainline.”

The Allstars turn out some great renditions of traditional Gospel numbers—Curtis Mayfield’s “People Get Ready” with Hiram Joseph on the lead vocal, Levy takes the lead on “Higher Ground,” and John Finley goes back to Sam Cooke’s roots with “A Change is Gonna Come,” bluesy and rich. This isn’t the case of a Gospel group singing the obligatory standards; the Allstars put their mark on these songs, bringing new sounds of the Gospel from these songs of the past.

The title track is a song by Bob Dylan and Tim Drummond. Drummond joins the Allstars, playing bass throughout the album. The song is from Dylan’s Christian phase when he wrote overtly about his faith in Jesus. Since then, it is debatable about what happened to Dylan’s faith, although I’d say there’s still plenty of hope and redemption in his songs even when they’re not pointedly Christian. The NorthernBlues Gospel Allstars take Dylan’s folk-Gospel-rock while adding a bunch of funk and blues. When they sing, “I’m so glad,” you’ll sing “I’m so glad” right along with them, glad for the music, the faith, the hope, and the funk.


Released this past spring, NorthernBlues offers another collaboration which goes in a completely different direction. John and the Sisters joins the Sisters Euclid Band with blues vocalist John Dickie. Sisters Euclid is led by Kevin Breit, guitarist for Norah Jones and Cassandra Wilson, among others.

The album begins with a little New Orleans-style piano, but then the band breaks in with a junkyard beat complete with Dickie’s growling chant on the chorus. Dickie’s part bluesman, part Gospel singer—vamping on the tune and shouting a “c’mon” invitation, while still having a good at some Prince-like screams. Wanna another comparison? Dickie’s album picture looks a bit like Greg Brown.

The smoky, dirty blues on tracks like “Big Bomb” land John and the Sisters next to the Tommy Castro Band. However, this project recorded in 3 days yields more experimentation than Castro or other similar blues bands. John and the Sisters throw in a soulful, R&B instrumental (“Treat Her Right”), soundclips/jazz blurps/transitional tracks (“Bad Machine”, “And We Touched,” “Hocktaves”), and an AltCountry blues/drum loop/jazz horn piece (“Son of a Gun”).

These little experiments may have caused some to feel this album is rather uneven, but given the description of the project’s process, they only prove to invite us to be present at the creation, to glimpse the collision of multiple musical visions.

Jumping out on this album are Suzie Vinnick’s guest vocals (“Only One,” “L,A”, and “Money Changes Everything”), bluesy harmonies that mellow Dickie’s vocals, yielding something outstandingly beautiful. It is the kind of thing that really entwines your heart with the blues.

Also, watch your hips begin to shake on “Pralene,” a jump boogie about Pralene, the trailer park queen, on which Rob Gusevs lights up the organ. On “Penguin Walk,” you may just find yourself trying out a penguin walk as you jam to this rocker. “Good Day” sounds like it could be from a musical, what with the horn line, drum beat right for a dance number, and the whole company joining in on the chorus. Of course, it’s a musical about toilets and writing home to Hamilton, Ontario. That’s the combination that gives John and the Sisters a junkyard blues feel where you’ll discover treasures that others might have cast off as trash.


WIN A CD!
If you’d like to check out what else NorthernBlues Music has to offer as a great blues label from Canada, you can check out the 2002 compilation, The Future of the Blues. The first 4 people to email me won a free copy. Winners: Jamie of Washington, D.C., Shari of Chicago, Chris of Durham, NC, and David of Lexington, KY. Standout tracks include Harry Manx’s acoustic blues on “Don’t Forget to Miss Me,” Paul Reddick & the Sidemen’s swing blues “One Way Trip,” Otis Taylor’s gentle acoustic picking “My Soul’s in Louisiana,” and the amazing fingerstyle guitar and haunting vocals of David Jacbos-Strain’s “River Was Green.”

Thanks to NorthernBlues Music for the review copies and the giveaway CDs.