STEVE FORBERT
''OVER WITH YOU''
SEPTEMBER 11 2012
36:52
1. All I Asked Of You /3:39
2. All I Need To Do /3:34
3. In Love With You /4:23
4. That'll Be Alright /3:33
5. Baby, I Know /2:52
6. Over With You /4:03
7. Don't Look Down, Pollyanna /4:28
8. Can't We Get Together? /3:07
9. Metal Marie /3:26
10. Sugarcane Plum Fairy /3:48
All Tracks By Forbert
Steve Forbert/Guitar, Vocals
Sheldon Gomberg/Bass (Electric), Bass (Upright)
Ben Harper/Guitar
Michael Jerome/Drums, Percussion
Ben Sollee/Bass (Electric), Cello
Jason Yates/Fender Rhodes, Organ (Hammond), Piano, Pump Organ, Wurlitzer
REVIEW
by Steve Leggett
Steve Forbert's debut album in 1978, Alive on Arrival, got him slapped with the "new Dylan" sticker, a death watch if there ever was one, since only Bob Dylan is or ever will be Bob Dylan, and placed unfair expectations on this gifted singer and songwriter from Mississippi. Forbert did manage a lone radio hit, "Romeo's Tune," in 1979, and while he's recorded a lot of impressive songs and albums since, the Dylan label was an albatross, and Forbert has been pretty much a well-kept secret ever since. His latest, the sparse and moving Over with You, finds his voice showing some wear and tear, but his songwriting, always more directly personal than Dylan's, is as sharp as ever. The production here is sparse and hushed, and mostly acoustic, and these ten songs form a kind of song cycle about the wins, losses, and complexities of relationships -- Forbert's Blood on the Tracks, if you will, but stripped for the most part of the layered metaphors typical of Dylan's writing. The album's opener, "All I Asked of You," sets the tone. Unhurried and direct, the song is an honest look at expectations in a relationship, and Forbert delivers it with a sort of honesty that Dylan usually struggles to veil, however magnificently. Everything follows with an easy, unhurried pace, rich in small detail, and songs like "In Love with You" have a sort of resigned, exhausted acceptance of love that only hard years of experience can earn. The one song here that does remind one of Dylan is the closer, "Sugarcane Plum Fairy," which is rich in sharply observed poetics and metaphor, and the kind of writing that got Forbert into the Dylan straitjacket over 30 years ago in the first place. What gets lost in all that is the fact that Forbert, while he didn't turn out to be the new Dylan, if he ever even wanted to be, is a wonderful songwriter with a clear and sharply observed vision of how life in the heart unfolds and reveals itself with the passage of time.
BIOGRAPHY
by Jason Ankeny
Anointed "the new Dylan" upon his recording debut, folk-rock singer/songwriter Steve Forbert was born in Meridian, MS, in 1954. After learning guitar at age 11, he spent his high school years playing in a variety of local bands before quitting his job as a truck driver and moving to New York City at the age of 21. There, he performed for spare change in Grand Central Station before working his way up to the Manhattan club circuit. After signing to Nemperor, Forbert debuted in 1978 with Alive on Arrival, which earned critical acclaim for its taut, poetic lyrics. The follow-up, 1979's Jackrabbit Slim, was his most successful outing, reaching the Top 20 on the strength of the hit single "Romeo's Tune" (allegedly inspired by the late Supreme Florence Ballard). However, both 1980's Little Stevie Orbit and a self-titled 1982 effort fared poorly, and Forbert was dropped by his label. He spent much of the decade in Nashville, where he continued honing his songwriting skills and performed regularly throughout the South. In 1988, he signed to Geffen, where the E Street Band's Garry Tallent produced his comeback album, Streets of This Town. Pete Anderson took over the production reins for 1992's The American in Me, but Forbert's continued lack of chart success prompted the label to cut him loose. A deal with the Warner Bros.-affiliated Giant label resulted in two more studio albums, 1995's Mission of the Crossroad Palms and 1996's Rocking Horse Head, but in 1998 Forbert moved into independent territory for his next album, the rollicking live set Here's Your Pizza. Forbert signed with Koch Records for his next studio disc, 2000's Evergreen Boy, where he also released Any Old Time (a tribute to country music legend Jimmie Rodgers) in 2002 and Just Like There's Nothin' to It (a collection of new songs) in 2004. During this period, Forbert also released two compilations of rare and unreleased material, Young, Guitar Days and More Young, Guitar Days, as well as several live recordings. On Stage at World Cafe Live appeared in 2007 from Decca Vision as well as a new studio set, Strange Names and New Sensations, from 429 Records that same year. The Place and the Time arrived in 2009. The Chris Goldsmith-produced Over with You, a sparse song cycle that shows Forbert's fine songwriting skills, appeared in 2012.
DoWnLoAd
''OVER WITH YOU''
SEPTEMBER 11 2012
36:52
1. All I Asked Of You /3:39
2. All I Need To Do /3:34
3. In Love With You /4:23
4. That'll Be Alright /3:33
5. Baby, I Know /2:52
6. Over With You /4:03
7. Don't Look Down, Pollyanna /4:28
8. Can't We Get Together? /3:07
9. Metal Marie /3:26
10. Sugarcane Plum Fairy /3:48
All Tracks By Forbert
Steve Forbert/Guitar, Vocals
Sheldon Gomberg/Bass (Electric), Bass (Upright)
Ben Harper/Guitar
Michael Jerome/Drums, Percussion
Ben Sollee/Bass (Electric), Cello
Jason Yates/Fender Rhodes, Organ (Hammond), Piano, Pump Organ, Wurlitzer
REVIEW
by Steve Leggett
Steve Forbert's debut album in 1978, Alive on Arrival, got him slapped with the "new Dylan" sticker, a death watch if there ever was one, since only Bob Dylan is or ever will be Bob Dylan, and placed unfair expectations on this gifted singer and songwriter from Mississippi. Forbert did manage a lone radio hit, "Romeo's Tune," in 1979, and while he's recorded a lot of impressive songs and albums since, the Dylan label was an albatross, and Forbert has been pretty much a well-kept secret ever since. His latest, the sparse and moving Over with You, finds his voice showing some wear and tear, but his songwriting, always more directly personal than Dylan's, is as sharp as ever. The production here is sparse and hushed, and mostly acoustic, and these ten songs form a kind of song cycle about the wins, losses, and complexities of relationships -- Forbert's Blood on the Tracks, if you will, but stripped for the most part of the layered metaphors typical of Dylan's writing. The album's opener, "All I Asked of You," sets the tone. Unhurried and direct, the song is an honest look at expectations in a relationship, and Forbert delivers it with a sort of honesty that Dylan usually struggles to veil, however magnificently. Everything follows with an easy, unhurried pace, rich in small detail, and songs like "In Love with You" have a sort of resigned, exhausted acceptance of love that only hard years of experience can earn. The one song here that does remind one of Dylan is the closer, "Sugarcane Plum Fairy," which is rich in sharply observed poetics and metaphor, and the kind of writing that got Forbert into the Dylan straitjacket over 30 years ago in the first place. What gets lost in all that is the fact that Forbert, while he didn't turn out to be the new Dylan, if he ever even wanted to be, is a wonderful songwriter with a clear and sharply observed vision of how life in the heart unfolds and reveals itself with the passage of time.
BIOGRAPHY
by Jason Ankeny
Anointed "the new Dylan" upon his recording debut, folk-rock singer/songwriter Steve Forbert was born in Meridian, MS, in 1954. After learning guitar at age 11, he spent his high school years playing in a variety of local bands before quitting his job as a truck driver and moving to New York City at the age of 21. There, he performed for spare change in Grand Central Station before working his way up to the Manhattan club circuit. After signing to Nemperor, Forbert debuted in 1978 with Alive on Arrival, which earned critical acclaim for its taut, poetic lyrics. The follow-up, 1979's Jackrabbit Slim, was his most successful outing, reaching the Top 20 on the strength of the hit single "Romeo's Tune" (allegedly inspired by the late Supreme Florence Ballard). However, both 1980's Little Stevie Orbit and a self-titled 1982 effort fared poorly, and Forbert was dropped by his label. He spent much of the decade in Nashville, where he continued honing his songwriting skills and performed regularly throughout the South. In 1988, he signed to Geffen, where the E Street Band's Garry Tallent produced his comeback album, Streets of This Town. Pete Anderson took over the production reins for 1992's The American in Me, but Forbert's continued lack of chart success prompted the label to cut him loose. A deal with the Warner Bros.-affiliated Giant label resulted in two more studio albums, 1995's Mission of the Crossroad Palms and 1996's Rocking Horse Head, but in 1998 Forbert moved into independent territory for his next album, the rollicking live set Here's Your Pizza. Forbert signed with Koch Records for his next studio disc, 2000's Evergreen Boy, where he also released Any Old Time (a tribute to country music legend Jimmie Rodgers) in 2002 and Just Like There's Nothin' to It (a collection of new songs) in 2004. During this period, Forbert also released two compilations of rare and unreleased material, Young, Guitar Days and More Young, Guitar Days, as well as several live recordings. On Stage at World Cafe Live appeared in 2007 from Decca Vision as well as a new studio set, Strange Names and New Sensations, from 429 Records that same year. The Place and the Time arrived in 2009. The Chris Goldsmith-produced Over with You, a sparse song cycle that shows Forbert's fine songwriting skills, appeared in 2012.
DoWnLoAd
