SCOTT MORGAN
''THREE CHORDS AN A CLOUD OF DUST, DISC THREE''
MARCH 25 2013
229:29
DISC ONE
1 /Look What You're Doing to Me Baby feat. The Rationals/3:03
2 /Respect feat. The Rationals
Otis Redding/2:40
3 /I Need You feat. The Rationals
Gerry Goffin/3:43
4 /Guitar Army feat. The Rationals/3:17
5 /Barefootin' feat. The Rationals
Robert Parker/2:48
6 /Cool Breeze feat. Guardian Angel/3:33
7 /Let's Work Together feat. Guardian Angel
Wilbert Harrison/2:07
8 /Hijackin' Love feat. Guardian Angel/4:12
9 /Things Get Better feat. Guardian Angel
Eddie Floyd/3:07
10 /Take a Look/3:24
11 /Soul Mover/3:18
12 /Mystically Yours [Take 1 - Basement Tape] feat. Sonic's Rendezvous Band/5:51
13 /Succeed feat. Sonic's Rendezvous Band/3:51
14 /Electrophonic Tonic [Master Version] feat. Sonic's Rendezvous Band/3:56
15 /Asteroid B-612 feat. Sonic's Rendezvous Band/5:00
16 /Satisfying Love feat. Brothers Of The Road/4:38
17 /Power & Glory feat. Sonic's Rendezvous Band/4:45
18 /Love & Learn feat. Brothers Of The Road/2:56
19 /Pirate Music feat. Brothers Of The Road/3:42
20 /Gypsy Dancer [Basement Demo] feat. Brothers Of The Road/2:50
21 /Come on Baby feat. Scott Morgan Group/2:29
22 /She's Wild [Basement Tape] feat. Scott Morgan Group/2:57
DISC TWO
1 /Detroit feat. Scott Morgan Group/4:00
2 /Heaven and Earth feat. Scott Morgan Group/3:44
3 /Everything feat. Scott Morgan Group/3:43
4 /The Monkey Time feat. The Rationals/3:47
5 /Josie's Well [Acoustic Cable TV Session] feat. Scots Pirates/5:37
6 /The Road Home [Acoustic Cable TV Session] feat. Scots Pirates/4:04
7 /And Then There Was Love feat. Scots Pirates/4:10
8 /Other End of the City feat. Scots Pirates/2:56
9 /Stick to Your Guns feat. Scots Pirates/3:29
10 /88 feat. Scots Pirates/4:31
11 /I Got a Right feat. Dodge Main/3:09
12 /City Slang [Live in Studio-Acoustic] feat. Motor Jam
Fred "Sonic" Smith/4:43
13 /Respect
Otis Redding/2:43
14 /Leavin' Here
Lamont Dozier / Brian Holland / Eddie Holland/3:03
15 /Endless Summer/3:12
16 /Downright Blue feat. The Hellacopters/4:34
17 /16 with a Bullet feat. The Hellacopters/2:39
18 /Dangerous feat. Hydromatics/2:52
DISC THREE
1 /Getting There Is Half the Fun feat. Hydromatics/3:36
2 /Earthy feat. Hydromatics/2:41
3 /Runaway Slaves feat. Hydromatics/4:16
4 /Satisfier [Alternate Guitar Version]/3:24
5 /Tumblin' Down feat. Hydromatics/3:56
6 /R.I.P. Rock 'n' Roll feat. Hydromatics/2:31
7 /Future/Now feat. Tek, Morgan & 3 Assassins
Rob Tyner/3:25
8 /1969 feat. Powertrane
The Stooges/3:57
9 /You're So Great feat. Hydromatics
Fred "Sonic" Smith/3:14
10 /I Have to Quit You Baby feat. The Solution/2:51
11 /Top of the Stairs feat. The Solution/3:45
12 /Would You Change Your Mind feat. The Solution/3:03
13 /She Messed Up My Mind feat. The Solution/4:38
14 /Beyond the Sound feat. Powertrane/2:45
15 /You Gotta Come Down feat. The Solution/3:24
16 /Somebody feat. The Solution/3:10
17 /Standin' at the Juke feat. Hydromatics/2:40
18 /2+2=? feat. Powertrane
Bob Seger/3:27
19 /Do I Move You?
Bobbie Gentry/2:43
20 /Mississippi Delta
Nina Simone/4:44
21 /Soothe Me
Sam Cooke/3:02
22 /The Wind
Nolan Strong/3:14
REVIEW
by Stephen Thomas Erlewine
In some quarters, Scott Morgan is an unquestionable rock & roll hero, a lifer who survived any number of slings and arrows hurled his way, always operating on the fringe but as a matter of choice as much as necessity. Morgan made his bones in the Rationals, the pivotal Ann Arbor garage rockers who laid the groundwork for the Stooges and the MC5, and cut Otis Redding's "Respect" long before Aretha Franklin (thereby inspiring speculation the Detroit native may have been inspired to record her iconic version by these rockers), and Morgan remained a fixture in Southeastern Michigan, playing with Sonic's Rendezvous Band in the '70s, the Scott Morgan Band in the '80s, and Scots Pirates in the '90s, along with a bunch of other bands as he piled up a pretty confusing discography. Even if it samples from every era of his career, Easy Action's 2013 box set Three Chords and a Cloud of Dust doesn't attempt to sort out this byzantine catalog, but rather offers a rousing testament to Morgan's passion, a tremendous trawl through the vaults (as well as the private cassette stashes of collectors) that gets at the heart of why Morgan is beloved by a dedicated guitar army
Sequenced chronologically, the three-disc set illustrates that Morgan was remarkably adaptable for a true believer, embracing the various trends of the day before he settled into a rock & soul torch bearer in the new millennium. By piecing together the hits, high points, singles, live performances, and unheard gems, Three Chords and a Cloud of Dust follows all the peaks and valleys of Morgan's career, but in this context it all seems like peaks. Maybe the money never started rolling in, maybe there aren't so many people who know the name Scott Morgan, but this box -- produced by Carlton Sandercock and Geoff Ginsberg and annotated by the latter -- is constructed so it seems like the rocker never had a slip, that he was always cranking out high-octane rock & roll no matter how large or small his audience may be. This passion has a way of generating passion, but even those who don't count themselves among his cult will be knocked out by the consistency of Three Chords. Throughout, Morgan's dedication to old-fashioned rock & roll and R&B is apparent; it's still there in the late '70s and early '80s, when his signatures were amped up and streamlined in the chance they could crossover to a mainstream AOR audience. That they never did is a bit mystifying in terms of quality, but Ginsberg's notes illustrate the knotty path of Morgan's career, how bands simply faded away and some records never materialized, and that does make Three Chords and a Cloud of Dust all the more valuable because despite his prolific output, Morgan was never fully part of his time due entirely to business reasons. Isolated from music, as he is here, he sounds almost undeniable, a powerhouse singer and skilled writer who never lost sight of his strengths. Whether he's singing originals, covering classics, or interpreting the words of other writers, Morgan always performs with conviction and soul, pushing soul into rock & roll and vice-versa. Sometimes, the performances here are so molten you'll be surprised that they were recorded long after Morgan's supposed peak -- his '90s recordings with Scots Pirates, Motor Jam, the Hellacopters, and Hydromatics burn furiously bright, suggesting a band that's 20 years younger -- but that's the wonderful thing about this necessary box set: the only detectable shifts are through the inevitable passing of eras, and Scott Morgan remains the impassioned constant, a true believer to the very end. Three discs may seem like a lot to the uninitiated -- to the converted, it's too brief -- but Three Chords and a Cloud of Dust is a blazing, brilliant monument to Scott Morgan and all of the pure rock & soul he loves. It has everything you need but will leave you wanting more.
BIOGRAPHY
by Mark Deming
Scott Morgan is one of the major and enduring figures on the Michigan rock scene, forming his first band well before the British Invasion helped sparked the '60s garage rock explosion and still playing tough, soulful rock & roll nearly 50 years later. Born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, Morgan came from a family of music fans, and after he caught the music bug as a child, his parents bought him a guitar and he learned to play, first inspired by instrumental acts like Lonnie Mack and the Ventures. While attending Forsythe Junior High, Morgan struck up a friendship with fellow student Steve Correll, who also played guitar, and in 1962 they decided to form a band. Steve's brother came up with the name the Rationals, and when a local high school student named Bob Pretzfelder agreed to play drums, the band had its first proper lineup. By the time Morgan and Correll had moved on to Ann Arbor's Pioneer High School, Bill Figg had replaced Pretzfelder, and when Steve's parents decided to send him to military school for a year, Terry Trabandt became the group's new guitarist. Correll returned to Ann Arbor and Pioneer High by 1964, and with Steve back on guitar and Terry on bass guitar, the classic lineup of the Rationals was in place.
Influenced by the new sounds of British acts like the Beatles and the Kinks and the emotional power of soul and R&B, the Rationals were one of the Midwest's first great blue-eyed soul combos, fueled by Morgan's powerful vocals, and after hooking up with manager and producer Jeep Holland, they became one of the most popular acts in the state, sharing stages with many of the biggest names of the day and cutting a handful of regional hits for Holland's A-Square Records label, including a 1966 version of Otis Redding's "Respect" that predated Aretha Franklin's cover. Cameo-Parkway picked up "Respect" for nationwide release, and their version of the Goffin/King classic "I Need You" won them a short-lived deal with Capitol Records, but as the Rationals began embracing a harder sound and emphasizing the guitar interplay between Correll and Morgan, they parted ways with Holland. The band moved from teen clubs to psychedelic ballrooms, and in 1969, after Morgan turned down an invitation from Al Kooper to join Blood, Sweat & Tears, the Rationals finally recorded their belated debut album. But by the time it was released in 1970, the bandmembers were at odds with one another, and when the album proved to be a commercial disappointment, the Rationals called it quits.
Within a few months of the Rationals' breakup, Morgan and Trabandt formed a new group called Guardian Angel; the band didn't last long, and Morgan next formed a combo called Lightning. In 1973, Morgan cut a solo single, "Take a Look" b/w "Soul Mover," which featured Fred "Sonic" Smith of the MC5 on lead guitar; it marked the beginning of a collaboration with Smith that would lead to the formation of Sonic's Rendezvous Band in 1975. Arguably the best rock band to never cut an album, SRB featured Morgan and Smith on guitars and vocals, Gary Rasmussen of the Up on bass, and Scott Asheton of the Stooges on drums. The group took the high-energy sound of the MC5 as a starting point and made it both leaner and more muscular; SRB earned a passionate following in the Midwest for their electrifying live shows, but without record label interest, the band wasn't able to take its local success to the next level, and in 1980 they broke up after releasing just one single, with the song "City Slang" on both sides. (Eventually, the group became a legend among fans of high-energy rock, and a number of posthumous releases of live tapes and demos have appeared, most notably a six-disc box set released by Easy Action Records in 2006.)
After the breakup of Sonic's Rendezvous Band, Morgan formed the Scott Morgan Band, featuring Rasmussen and Asheton on bass and drums; after cutting an album for a French label, the group evolved into Scots Pirates, with Morgan trading off vocals with Kathy Deschaine and playing off a rotating lineup of guitarists, including Brian Delaney, Bobby East, and Michael Katon. (In 1991, before Scots Pirates got off the ground, there was a short-lived Rationals reunion; recordings of the reassembled band appear on the Morgan collection Medium Rare.) After Scots Pirates released a pair of albums for the Michigan-based Schoolkids Records label, Morgan joined the supergroup Dodge Main, which also featured Wayne Kramer of the MC5 and Deniz Tek of Radio Birdman; the short-lived combo released an album for Alive Records in 1996. In 1998, Morgan met up with Nicke Royale of the Swedish hard rock band the Hellacopters; a big fan of Sonic's Rendezvous Band, Royale suggested a collaboration, and he and Morgan formed the Hydromatics, whose 1999 album Parts Unknown paid explicit homage to the high-energy sound of Michigan's golden age. Morgan and Royale have also worked together in another international combo, the Solution, rooted in the sounds of classic soul and R&B and putting Morgan's vocal talents to excellent use.
In 2001, Morgan crossed paths with Robert Gillespie, a talented guitarist who had worked with Rob Tyner, Mitch Ryder, and the Torpedos; after Gillespie played on some studio recordings with Morgan, the two clicked and formed Powertrane with Chris "Box" Taylor (Mazinga, the Avatars) on bass and Andy Frost (Hydromatics, the High Rollers) on drums. A series of shows with guest guitarists Deniz Tek and Ron Asheton of the Stooges were documented on the 2002 live album Ann Arbor Revival Meeting, while their first studio album, Beyond the Sound, was released in 2007. In 2009, Britain's Big Beat Records released a two-disc collection of the Rationals' recordings for A-Square Records, Think Rational!; to celebrate the release, Morgan did a series of live shows with a group of Detroit musicians he dubbed "the Irrationals," playing material from the Rationals' songbook. Several members of "the Irrationals," including Matthew Smith, Jim Diamond, Chris "Box" Taylor, and Dave Shettler, joined Morgan in the studio to record the 2010 album Scott Morgan, his first proper solo album in a recording career spanning five decades. Three years later, Easy Action released a rarities-filled triple-disc retrospective of Morgan's entire career called Three Chords and a Cloud of Dust.
''THREE CHORDS AN A CLOUD OF DUST, DISC THREE''
MARCH 25 2013
229:29
DISC ONE
1 /Look What You're Doing to Me Baby feat. The Rationals/3:03
2 /Respect feat. The Rationals
Otis Redding/2:40
3 /I Need You feat. The Rationals
Gerry Goffin/3:43
4 /Guitar Army feat. The Rationals/3:17
5 /Barefootin' feat. The Rationals
Robert Parker/2:48
6 /Cool Breeze feat. Guardian Angel/3:33
7 /Let's Work Together feat. Guardian Angel
Wilbert Harrison/2:07
8 /Hijackin' Love feat. Guardian Angel/4:12
9 /Things Get Better feat. Guardian Angel
Eddie Floyd/3:07
10 /Take a Look/3:24
11 /Soul Mover/3:18
12 /Mystically Yours [Take 1 - Basement Tape] feat. Sonic's Rendezvous Band/5:51
13 /Succeed feat. Sonic's Rendezvous Band/3:51
14 /Electrophonic Tonic [Master Version] feat. Sonic's Rendezvous Band/3:56
15 /Asteroid B-612 feat. Sonic's Rendezvous Band/5:00
16 /Satisfying Love feat. Brothers Of The Road/4:38
17 /Power & Glory feat. Sonic's Rendezvous Band/4:45
18 /Love & Learn feat. Brothers Of The Road/2:56
19 /Pirate Music feat. Brothers Of The Road/3:42
20 /Gypsy Dancer [Basement Demo] feat. Brothers Of The Road/2:50
21 /Come on Baby feat. Scott Morgan Group/2:29
22 /She's Wild [Basement Tape] feat. Scott Morgan Group/2:57
DISC TWO
1 /Detroit feat. Scott Morgan Group/4:00
2 /Heaven and Earth feat. Scott Morgan Group/3:44
3 /Everything feat. Scott Morgan Group/3:43
4 /The Monkey Time feat. The Rationals/3:47
5 /Josie's Well [Acoustic Cable TV Session] feat. Scots Pirates/5:37
6 /The Road Home [Acoustic Cable TV Session] feat. Scots Pirates/4:04
7 /And Then There Was Love feat. Scots Pirates/4:10
8 /Other End of the City feat. Scots Pirates/2:56
9 /Stick to Your Guns feat. Scots Pirates/3:29
10 /88 feat. Scots Pirates/4:31
11 /I Got a Right feat. Dodge Main/3:09
12 /City Slang [Live in Studio-Acoustic] feat. Motor Jam
Fred "Sonic" Smith/4:43
13 /Respect
Otis Redding/2:43
14 /Leavin' Here
Lamont Dozier / Brian Holland / Eddie Holland/3:03
15 /Endless Summer/3:12
16 /Downright Blue feat. The Hellacopters/4:34
17 /16 with a Bullet feat. The Hellacopters/2:39
18 /Dangerous feat. Hydromatics/2:52
DISC THREE
1 /Getting There Is Half the Fun feat. Hydromatics/3:36
2 /Earthy feat. Hydromatics/2:41
3 /Runaway Slaves feat. Hydromatics/4:16
4 /Satisfier [Alternate Guitar Version]/3:24
5 /Tumblin' Down feat. Hydromatics/3:56
6 /R.I.P. Rock 'n' Roll feat. Hydromatics/2:31
7 /Future/Now feat. Tek, Morgan & 3 Assassins
Rob Tyner/3:25
8 /1969 feat. Powertrane
The Stooges/3:57
9 /You're So Great feat. Hydromatics
Fred "Sonic" Smith/3:14
10 /I Have to Quit You Baby feat. The Solution/2:51
11 /Top of the Stairs feat. The Solution/3:45
12 /Would You Change Your Mind feat. The Solution/3:03
13 /She Messed Up My Mind feat. The Solution/4:38
14 /Beyond the Sound feat. Powertrane/2:45
15 /You Gotta Come Down feat. The Solution/3:24
16 /Somebody feat. The Solution/3:10
17 /Standin' at the Juke feat. Hydromatics/2:40
18 /2+2=? feat. Powertrane
Bob Seger/3:27
19 /Do I Move You?
Bobbie Gentry/2:43
20 /Mississippi Delta
Nina Simone/4:44
21 /Soothe Me
Sam Cooke/3:02
22 /The Wind
Nolan Strong/3:14
REVIEW
by Stephen Thomas Erlewine
In some quarters, Scott Morgan is an unquestionable rock & roll hero, a lifer who survived any number of slings and arrows hurled his way, always operating on the fringe but as a matter of choice as much as necessity. Morgan made his bones in the Rationals, the pivotal Ann Arbor garage rockers who laid the groundwork for the Stooges and the MC5, and cut Otis Redding's "Respect" long before Aretha Franklin (thereby inspiring speculation the Detroit native may have been inspired to record her iconic version by these rockers), and Morgan remained a fixture in Southeastern Michigan, playing with Sonic's Rendezvous Band in the '70s, the Scott Morgan Band in the '80s, and Scots Pirates in the '90s, along with a bunch of other bands as he piled up a pretty confusing discography. Even if it samples from every era of his career, Easy Action's 2013 box set Three Chords and a Cloud of Dust doesn't attempt to sort out this byzantine catalog, but rather offers a rousing testament to Morgan's passion, a tremendous trawl through the vaults (as well as the private cassette stashes of collectors) that gets at the heart of why Morgan is beloved by a dedicated guitar army
Sequenced chronologically, the three-disc set illustrates that Morgan was remarkably adaptable for a true believer, embracing the various trends of the day before he settled into a rock & soul torch bearer in the new millennium. By piecing together the hits, high points, singles, live performances, and unheard gems, Three Chords and a Cloud of Dust follows all the peaks and valleys of Morgan's career, but in this context it all seems like peaks. Maybe the money never started rolling in, maybe there aren't so many people who know the name Scott Morgan, but this box -- produced by Carlton Sandercock and Geoff Ginsberg and annotated by the latter -- is constructed so it seems like the rocker never had a slip, that he was always cranking out high-octane rock & roll no matter how large or small his audience may be. This passion has a way of generating passion, but even those who don't count themselves among his cult will be knocked out by the consistency of Three Chords. Throughout, Morgan's dedication to old-fashioned rock & roll and R&B is apparent; it's still there in the late '70s and early '80s, when his signatures were amped up and streamlined in the chance they could crossover to a mainstream AOR audience. That they never did is a bit mystifying in terms of quality, but Ginsberg's notes illustrate the knotty path of Morgan's career, how bands simply faded away and some records never materialized, and that does make Three Chords and a Cloud of Dust all the more valuable because despite his prolific output, Morgan was never fully part of his time due entirely to business reasons. Isolated from music, as he is here, he sounds almost undeniable, a powerhouse singer and skilled writer who never lost sight of his strengths. Whether he's singing originals, covering classics, or interpreting the words of other writers, Morgan always performs with conviction and soul, pushing soul into rock & roll and vice-versa. Sometimes, the performances here are so molten you'll be surprised that they were recorded long after Morgan's supposed peak -- his '90s recordings with Scots Pirates, Motor Jam, the Hellacopters, and Hydromatics burn furiously bright, suggesting a band that's 20 years younger -- but that's the wonderful thing about this necessary box set: the only detectable shifts are through the inevitable passing of eras, and Scott Morgan remains the impassioned constant, a true believer to the very end. Three discs may seem like a lot to the uninitiated -- to the converted, it's too brief -- but Three Chords and a Cloud of Dust is a blazing, brilliant monument to Scott Morgan and all of the pure rock & soul he loves. It has everything you need but will leave you wanting more.
BIOGRAPHY
by Mark Deming
Scott Morgan is one of the major and enduring figures on the Michigan rock scene, forming his first band well before the British Invasion helped sparked the '60s garage rock explosion and still playing tough, soulful rock & roll nearly 50 years later. Born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, Morgan came from a family of music fans, and after he caught the music bug as a child, his parents bought him a guitar and he learned to play, first inspired by instrumental acts like Lonnie Mack and the Ventures. While attending Forsythe Junior High, Morgan struck up a friendship with fellow student Steve Correll, who also played guitar, and in 1962 they decided to form a band. Steve's brother came up with the name the Rationals, and when a local high school student named Bob Pretzfelder agreed to play drums, the band had its first proper lineup. By the time Morgan and Correll had moved on to Ann Arbor's Pioneer High School, Bill Figg had replaced Pretzfelder, and when Steve's parents decided to send him to military school for a year, Terry Trabandt became the group's new guitarist. Correll returned to Ann Arbor and Pioneer High by 1964, and with Steve back on guitar and Terry on bass guitar, the classic lineup of the Rationals was in place.
Influenced by the new sounds of British acts like the Beatles and the Kinks and the emotional power of soul and R&B, the Rationals were one of the Midwest's first great blue-eyed soul combos, fueled by Morgan's powerful vocals, and after hooking up with manager and producer Jeep Holland, they became one of the most popular acts in the state, sharing stages with many of the biggest names of the day and cutting a handful of regional hits for Holland's A-Square Records label, including a 1966 version of Otis Redding's "Respect" that predated Aretha Franklin's cover. Cameo-Parkway picked up "Respect" for nationwide release, and their version of the Goffin/King classic "I Need You" won them a short-lived deal with Capitol Records, but as the Rationals began embracing a harder sound and emphasizing the guitar interplay between Correll and Morgan, they parted ways with Holland. The band moved from teen clubs to psychedelic ballrooms, and in 1969, after Morgan turned down an invitation from Al Kooper to join Blood, Sweat & Tears, the Rationals finally recorded their belated debut album. But by the time it was released in 1970, the bandmembers were at odds with one another, and when the album proved to be a commercial disappointment, the Rationals called it quits.
Within a few months of the Rationals' breakup, Morgan and Trabandt formed a new group called Guardian Angel; the band didn't last long, and Morgan next formed a combo called Lightning. In 1973, Morgan cut a solo single, "Take a Look" b/w "Soul Mover," which featured Fred "Sonic" Smith of the MC5 on lead guitar; it marked the beginning of a collaboration with Smith that would lead to the formation of Sonic's Rendezvous Band in 1975. Arguably the best rock band to never cut an album, SRB featured Morgan and Smith on guitars and vocals, Gary Rasmussen of the Up on bass, and Scott Asheton of the Stooges on drums. The group took the high-energy sound of the MC5 as a starting point and made it both leaner and more muscular; SRB earned a passionate following in the Midwest for their electrifying live shows, but without record label interest, the band wasn't able to take its local success to the next level, and in 1980 they broke up after releasing just one single, with the song "City Slang" on both sides. (Eventually, the group became a legend among fans of high-energy rock, and a number of posthumous releases of live tapes and demos have appeared, most notably a six-disc box set released by Easy Action Records in 2006.)
After the breakup of Sonic's Rendezvous Band, Morgan formed the Scott Morgan Band, featuring Rasmussen and Asheton on bass and drums; after cutting an album for a French label, the group evolved into Scots Pirates, with Morgan trading off vocals with Kathy Deschaine and playing off a rotating lineup of guitarists, including Brian Delaney, Bobby East, and Michael Katon. (In 1991, before Scots Pirates got off the ground, there was a short-lived Rationals reunion; recordings of the reassembled band appear on the Morgan collection Medium Rare.) After Scots Pirates released a pair of albums for the Michigan-based Schoolkids Records label, Morgan joined the supergroup Dodge Main, which also featured Wayne Kramer of the MC5 and Deniz Tek of Radio Birdman; the short-lived combo released an album for Alive Records in 1996. In 1998, Morgan met up with Nicke Royale of the Swedish hard rock band the Hellacopters; a big fan of Sonic's Rendezvous Band, Royale suggested a collaboration, and he and Morgan formed the Hydromatics, whose 1999 album Parts Unknown paid explicit homage to the high-energy sound of Michigan's golden age. Morgan and Royale have also worked together in another international combo, the Solution, rooted in the sounds of classic soul and R&B and putting Morgan's vocal talents to excellent use.
In 2001, Morgan crossed paths with Robert Gillespie, a talented guitarist who had worked with Rob Tyner, Mitch Ryder, and the Torpedos; after Gillespie played on some studio recordings with Morgan, the two clicked and formed Powertrane with Chris "Box" Taylor (Mazinga, the Avatars) on bass and Andy Frost (Hydromatics, the High Rollers) on drums. A series of shows with guest guitarists Deniz Tek and Ron Asheton of the Stooges were documented on the 2002 live album Ann Arbor Revival Meeting, while their first studio album, Beyond the Sound, was released in 2007. In 2009, Britain's Big Beat Records released a two-disc collection of the Rationals' recordings for A-Square Records, Think Rational!; to celebrate the release, Morgan did a series of live shows with a group of Detroit musicians he dubbed "the Irrationals," playing material from the Rationals' songbook. Several members of "the Irrationals," including Matthew Smith, Jim Diamond, Chris "Box" Taylor, and Dave Shettler, joined Morgan in the studio to record the 2010 album Scott Morgan, his first proper solo album in a recording career spanning five decades. Three years later, Easy Action released a rarities-filled triple-disc retrospective of Morgan's entire career called Three Chords and a Cloud of Dust.
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