Friday, October 23, 2009

Lucero

"1372 Overton Park"

Universal Republic Records

The Memphis-based Lucero have long tapped into that city's gritty Southern rock sound. Their "Nobody's Darlin" from 2005 remains among the finest alt-country albums of the decade.

With "1372 Overton Park," the criminally underappreciated foursome shifts quite naturally to their hometown's Mussel Shoals roots for a horn-fired session that recalls the glory days of Stax.

Lucero has always had soul, it just hasn't been this overt. And frontman Ben Nichols, a belter from his punk rock days, has just the sort of big, raspy voice that suits these barroom roof-raisers perfectly.

Jim Spake, the Memphis sax giant who has arranged horns for everyone from Al Green to Solomon Burke, manages a mix that straddles something between Springsteen's Asbury Park days, early Rolling Stones, and Booker T without the polish.

"What are you Willing to Lose" and "Smoke" are open-throttled rockers with Nichols soaring over the horns and Hammond B3. Lynyrd Skynyrd gets its props in "The Devil and Maggie Chascarillo," and the propulsive "Sounds of the City" is the kind of cut The Replacements were so good at.

The twangy Lucero of old peeks out from weepers like "Can't Feel a Thing." "So much to tell her/ But the words seem to get lost/ The bottle's empty/ And I can't complete the call," Nichols growls.

Then comes the showstopper, "Darken my Door," a slow, smoldering plea for reconciliation that would make Otis Redding weep.

Pieta Brown

"Shimmer"

Red House Records

Over the course of three albums in seven years, Pieta Brown has seemed ambivalent about outrunning the long shadow of her more famous father, Greg Brown.

The elder Brown has contributed guest vocals here and there and his longtime sideman, Bo Ramsey, has become Pieta's longtime sideman. And, she's now on her dad's record label. But, her press materials have been glaring in their omission of her parentage.

On "Shimmer," Pieta Brown has nowhere to hide, and nothing to hide. It's just her pretty but unremarkable voice with stripped-down versions of her own remarkable songs, and it turns out she doesn't need anything else.

Produced by Don Was, the seven demo tracks are powerful in their spareness, backed ever-so-subtly by Ramsey and Was. The result is an intimate set, Pieta singing just to you, late at night, on your moonlit front porch.

Miles Davis

"The Complete Miles Davis Columbia Album Collection"

Legacy Recordings

That's right, 52 Miles Davis albums in a single box, Davis' entire Columbia Records output from 1949 to 1985. Counting double albums and multiple disc releases, that's 70 CDs.

And while the $364 Amazon.com price seems a little over the top these days, it spreads out to about $5 a disc.

Sony has been dribbling out these albums in various reconfigurations almost since the second Davis died in 1991. In just the last four years or so, "Kind of Blue" alone has been reissued in at least seven variations. And it's hard to imagine any kind of Davis fan doesn't already have most of these recordings on CD.

Still, to have them all under one roof - the good, the bad and the ugly (mostly very, very good) - is tempting. And why not own late-career weaklings like "Star People" and "Aura," and the impenetrable "Dark Magus"? Even at his laziest and most petulant, Davis could dish moments of startling genius.

Davis completists will be drawn to the bonus DVD featuring Davis's second great quintet with Wayne Shorter and Herbie Hancock in Europe 1967. There also are plenty of bonus cuts, including the live tracks, "Ursula," "Aida" and "Fat Time" added to "We Want Miles."

And, although it's hard to imagine anything new could be said about Davis, there's a 250-page, 11,000-word biographical essay from Frédéric Goaty that manages a new perspective.