10194 - RANDALL BRAMBLETT - DEVIL MUSIC (2015)
RANDALL BRAMBLETT
''DEVIL MUSIC''
SEPTEMBER 18 2015
49:51
1 Dead In The Water 04:23
2 Devil Music 04:49
3 Bottom Of The Ocean 03:49
4 Angel Child 04:50
5 Pride In Place (Randall Bramblett, Davis Causey) 03:55
6 Reptile Pilot 03:19
7 Whiskey Headed Woman 05:54
8 Strong Love 04:34
9 Ride 05:46
10 Thing For You 04:44
11 Missing Link 03:43
Tracks By Randall Bramblett, Except 5
Randall Bramblett/Keyboards, Organ (Hammond), Piano, Sax (Soprano), Saxophone, Soloist, Vocals
Davis Causey/Electric Guitar
Gerry Hansen/Drums
Seth Hendershot/Drums, Percussion, Backing Vocals
Kevin Hyde/Trombone
Nick Johnson/Electric Guitar
Mark Knopfler/Electric Guitar On 1
Chuck Leavell/Piano On 6
Michael Rhodes/Bass Guitar
Tom Ryan/Baritone Sax
Michael Steele/Bass Guitar, Fretless Bass, Vocals (Background)
Derek Trucks/Electric Guitar On 4
**********
REVIEW/AMG
Thom Jurek
Devil Music, the tenth album by singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist Randall Bramblett, is a dark, swampy groovefest. Its 11 songs may depict broken characters, lost causes, wandering souls, and haunted spirits, but the songwriter celebrates them for who and what they are and revels unapologetically in their flaws and triumphs. Bramblett employs a musical patchwork of contemporary sonics and rhythms to extend the margins of blues, R&B, and gospel without watering them down. The core band features guitarists Davis Causey and Nick Johnson, drummer/producer/engineer Gerry Hansen, and either Michael Steele or Michael Rhodes on bass. They are augmented by occasional horns, a pair of percussionists, and a few heavy-hitting guests. "Dead in the Water" -- about being trapped in crime and addiction -- employs Bramblett's slippery Hammond B-3 to drive a rumbling bass and guitar vamp over a snare and bass-drum shuffle. His distorted, cracking vocal is pierced by Mark Knopfler's atypically meaty guitar lines. The title track offers a tale from Howlin' Wolf's biography about visiting his mama after his success. Her response? "Get away from me devil." The hip-hop rhythm, ambient loops, horns, and greasy guitar ride are pushed into the red by a quaking bass, and the vocal -- "Mama, I can't stop/Playin' that devil music/I got the devil music/Down in my soul" -- chills the marrow. In "Angel Child," a rounder tries to seduce an innocent while freely admitting his moral bankruptcy. Ballsy. Derek Trucks' wrangling, tonally rich slide guitar contrasts beautifully with Bramblett's slithering, soulful vocal. "Pride in Place" is a grimy, choogling blues-rocker, with punchy guitars, pulsing bassline, rattling tom-toms, and spiny keyboards under a desperate confessional narrative: "When you want to love somebody/With all your damaged soul/You don't want to know about/The fire that started that you can't control...." Former Sea Level bandmate Chuck Leavell adds spicy, New Orleans-style blues piano to the swaggering R&B in "Reptile Pilot." "Whiskey Headed Woman" filters noir-ish jazz-blues and modern R&B through the lens of D'Angelo's Voodoo. "Thing for You" is a cut-time, bumping soul tune with Bramblett's Wurlitzer piano (and tenor saxophone break) punching through brittle snares and silvery electric guitars. His singing -- especially in the falsetto -- soars effortlessly above the unshakable rhythm section. Lyrically, his songs balance conscientious rational choices against addictions and base human instincts through the paths and pitfalls of living in the boardroom or on the societal fringes. Devil Music may feel like an outlier in Bramblett's catalog, but restless experimentation has always been his trademark. The production, though far from slick, may initially startle, but through it, Bramblett reveals tradition to be a living, evolving process rather than a group of fixed archival notions.
**********
ABOUT THE ALBUM/OFFICIAL
Randall’s 10th release, Devil Music, pulls from a deep well. It embodies the authentic roots of American music, brilliantly blending them into this soul-drenched album. Special guests who appear on this are Mark Knopfler, Derek Trucks and Chuck Leavell. The title track refers to Howlin’ Wolf’s meeting with his estranged mother, who turned him away for playing “devil music.” He read that story in a book about Wolf and was able to ask Hubert Sumlin if it was true. He said it was and Wolf did cry all the way to Memphis. Some songs sprang from the tug-of-war between blues and religion, salvation and damnation. Bramblett says of this album. “It’s my experience of black and white culture in the south, and how it feels to grow up here with all the religion and pain and conflict and joy — and then there’s all that dancing…”
**********
OFFICIAL BIOGRAPHY
Randall Bramblett’s distinguished body of work is defined by a triple threat career as an acclaimed solo artist, an in-demand songwriter and a first call sideman. Among the artists who’ve recorded and performed Bramblett’s songs are Bettye LaVette, Hot Tuna, Delbert McClinton and most notably, Bonnie Raitt, who opened her 2014 Grammy winner, Slipstream, with one of his songs. In the ’70s he was a member of the seminal jazz/rock group Sea Level and as a sideman has toured with Gregg Allman, Widespread Panic and Levon Helm. Steve Winwood was such a fan of Bramblett’s keyboard, sax and vocal performances that he made Bramblett his go-to tour mate for 16 years, including the ’94 Traffic reunion.
But it’s Bramblett’s own career as frontman where his artistry is in full display. His experience as a band leader reaches back to his high school days in the railroad junction town of Jesup, Georgia, where Bramblett couldn’t help but absorb the field-rooted melodies and steel-wheeled rhythms he heard all around him. He fell in love with soul and R&B early, and was so attracted to the family piano that his parents let him start lessons at age 4 (his dad built extensions so he could reach the pedals). Guitar and sax came next and Bramblett began playing professionally while still in junior high. By the time he entered high school he was singing Temptations, Otis Redding and James Brown covers in a soul-funk band.
“We just wanted to do soul music because that’s what we all loved,” he recalls. “I used to listen to [Nashville-based] WLAC late at night because they played all this great soul and blues and R&B, and sermons and gospel music. That stuff just grabbed me and it still does.” His high school bandmates stuck together even after Bramblett went off to UNC Chapel Hill to college. “I’d be hitchhiking to Mississippi or Alabama for weekend shows and have to scramble to get back for Monday classes.”
In college he also started writing songs, influenced by Dylan and North Carolina native James Taylor. Moving to Athens, Georgia after graduation, he landed in the Capricorn Records house band and toured with Gregg Allman. In 1975 and ’76 he released his first two solo albums on Polydor. Shortly after he joined forces with Chuck Leavell and Sea Level.
“After Capricorn Records folded, Sea Level slowly fell apart and I kind of stopped everything for a few years. I cleaned up my act and eventually got invited to join Steve Winwood in ’88. Working with Steve gave me the confidence and energy to focus on songwriting again. I started part two of my solo career by recording See Through Me for a re-formed Capricorn Records in ’98,” explains Bramblett. “I’ve been focused on my own voice and songwriting since then. I always try to push the boundaries; it’s always exciting to see what will happen with each new recording.”
His latest New West release, the dark, Southern, soul-drenched Devil Music, is his sixth for the label and the tenth of his career. Like his others, it features compelling, unusually arranged melodies coupled with thoughtful, deftly worded lyrics.
The new recording features guitarist Derek Trucks whose dirtied-up slide counterpoints Bramblett’s falsetto in “Angel Child,” and keyboardist and fellow Sea Level alum, Chuck Leavell, who adds serious boogie to the witty “Reptile Pilot.” The guitar master, Mark Knopfler also makes a guest appearance and adds significantly on “Dead in the Water”—a swampy gem which definitely belongs on the soundtrack to an HBO series.
“When I wrote ‘Devil Music’ about Howlin’ Wolf’s meeting with his estranged mother, I knew I had the feel and the heart of the record. Songs like ‘Dead in the Water,’ ‘Whiskey Headed Woman’ and “Bottom of the Ocean” all sprang from the tug-of-war between blues and religion, salvation and damnation,” says Bramblett. “The overdriven vocal sound we used helped bring home the pain and defiance we wanted on these songs. The way I’m singing is more intense. The songs have this fundamental power that I just needed to express.”
In many songs, he says, “lost characters” abound. Some appear in the album opener and title track, while the aforementioned “Dead in the Water” was inspired by William S. Burroughs and his speed-freak wife (“scrubbin’ the floor with a toothbrush/but she just can’t get it clean”).
“It’s a picture of being stuck, whether it’s addiction or crime,” Bramblett explains. “There’s no resolution; you’re just dead in the water.”
The protagonist in “Angel Child” comically tries to lure a lover into the seedy web of his broken down life while the character in “Bottom of the Ocean” dreams of escape. These songs gain further impact from their construction and many are built around a single chord.
“Several of them are basically field songs where you’re coming down on the one like you’re chopping stuff, and you just stay there,” continues Bramblett. “The rest of the interest comes out of the ambient sounds, the lyrics and the inspiration of the players. The effect is trancelike; it pulls you in.”
Michael Rhodes who has played on most of Randall’s solo work helped arrange a series of sessions in Nashville at Sound Stage Studios with Chuck Ainlay, Ed Cherney, Elliot Scheiner, Frank Filopetti and George Massenburg.
“It was a fabulous experience working with these guys and they couldn’t have been more fun and supportive. My long time band mates, Davis Causey, Nick Johnson, Michael Steele and Gerry Hansen all came up from Athens to make this record,” recounts Bramblett. “We turned the place into a juke joint! Seth Hendershot, Tom Ryan and Kevin Hyde joined us to finish up overdubs at Gerry’s studio in Lawrenceville, Georgia.”
“I’m pullin’ from a deep well on this album,” Bramblett concludes. “It’s my experience of black and white culture in the south, and how it feels to grow up here with all the religion and pain and conflict and joy—and then there’s all that dancing…”
**********
BIOGRAPHY/AMG
Tim Griggs
Randall Bramblett is an accomplished singer/songwriter/multi-instrumentalist whose credits include work with Sea Level, Steve Winwood, Gregg Allman, Levon Helm and Robbie Robertson. Bramblett released his third solo album, See Through Me, in 1997, two decades after his previous solo release. During that 20-year period, Bramblett was a member of the Southern jazz fusion group Sea Level a touring member of the reunited Traffic, as well as a busy studio musician--epecially with Winwood. He was born in Jesup, Georgia, and heavily influenced by R&B music, gospel, blues, and folk. Bramblett plays keyboards, saxophones, guitar, mandolin, and harmonica. His songwriting is often moody and cinematic, as evidenced on albums for New West: 2001's No More Mr. Lucky, 2004's Thin Places, and 2006's Rich Someday. For 2008's Now It's Tomorrow, Bramblett wrote and arranged all the songs. It was the first time in the decade he'd worked without his friend and collaborator Davis Causey. He had written the songs piecemeal before entering the studio -- a first for him. Bramblett's "Used to Rule the World" appeared as the opening track on Bonnie Raitt's Grammy-winning Slipstream in 2012 (he also co-wrote "Down to You" with the artist and George Marinelli for that record). He also returned to recording that year. New West issued the all-original The Bright Spots in May of 2013. He spent the next year and a half touring and playing with his own band or as a guest at festivals, and was featured in the PBS Living Legends series. Bramblett reteamed with New West for 2015's Devil Music. The set featured guest spots from Mark Knopfler, Derek Trucks, and Chuck Leavell.
**********
BIOGRAPHY/WIKIPEDIA
**********
WEBSITE
**********
TO THE TOP
**********
''DEVIL MUSIC''
SEPTEMBER 18 2015
49:51
1 Dead In The Water 04:23
2 Devil Music 04:49
3 Bottom Of The Ocean 03:49
4 Angel Child 04:50
5 Pride In Place (Randall Bramblett, Davis Causey) 03:55
6 Reptile Pilot 03:19
7 Whiskey Headed Woman 05:54
8 Strong Love 04:34
9 Ride 05:46
10 Thing For You 04:44
11 Missing Link 03:43
Tracks By Randall Bramblett, Except 5
Randall Bramblett/Keyboards, Organ (Hammond), Piano, Sax (Soprano), Saxophone, Soloist, Vocals
Davis Causey/Electric Guitar
Gerry Hansen/Drums
Seth Hendershot/Drums, Percussion, Backing Vocals
Kevin Hyde/Trombone
Nick Johnson/Electric Guitar
Mark Knopfler/Electric Guitar On 1
Chuck Leavell/Piano On 6
Michael Rhodes/Bass Guitar
Tom Ryan/Baritone Sax
Michael Steele/Bass Guitar, Fretless Bass, Vocals (Background)
Derek Trucks/Electric Guitar On 4
**********
REVIEW/AMG
Thom Jurek
Devil Music, the tenth album by singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist Randall Bramblett, is a dark, swampy groovefest. Its 11 songs may depict broken characters, lost causes, wandering souls, and haunted spirits, but the songwriter celebrates them for who and what they are and revels unapologetically in their flaws and triumphs. Bramblett employs a musical patchwork of contemporary sonics and rhythms to extend the margins of blues, R&B, and gospel without watering them down. The core band features guitarists Davis Causey and Nick Johnson, drummer/producer/engineer Gerry Hansen, and either Michael Steele or Michael Rhodes on bass. They are augmented by occasional horns, a pair of percussionists, and a few heavy-hitting guests. "Dead in the Water" -- about being trapped in crime and addiction -- employs Bramblett's slippery Hammond B-3 to drive a rumbling bass and guitar vamp over a snare and bass-drum shuffle. His distorted, cracking vocal is pierced by Mark Knopfler's atypically meaty guitar lines. The title track offers a tale from Howlin' Wolf's biography about visiting his mama after his success. Her response? "Get away from me devil." The hip-hop rhythm, ambient loops, horns, and greasy guitar ride are pushed into the red by a quaking bass, and the vocal -- "Mama, I can't stop/Playin' that devil music/I got the devil music/Down in my soul" -- chills the marrow. In "Angel Child," a rounder tries to seduce an innocent while freely admitting his moral bankruptcy. Ballsy. Derek Trucks' wrangling, tonally rich slide guitar contrasts beautifully with Bramblett's slithering, soulful vocal. "Pride in Place" is a grimy, choogling blues-rocker, with punchy guitars, pulsing bassline, rattling tom-toms, and spiny keyboards under a desperate confessional narrative: "When you want to love somebody/With all your damaged soul/You don't want to know about/The fire that started that you can't control...." Former Sea Level bandmate Chuck Leavell adds spicy, New Orleans-style blues piano to the swaggering R&B in "Reptile Pilot." "Whiskey Headed Woman" filters noir-ish jazz-blues and modern R&B through the lens of D'Angelo's Voodoo. "Thing for You" is a cut-time, bumping soul tune with Bramblett's Wurlitzer piano (and tenor saxophone break) punching through brittle snares and silvery electric guitars. His singing -- especially in the falsetto -- soars effortlessly above the unshakable rhythm section. Lyrically, his songs balance conscientious rational choices against addictions and base human instincts through the paths and pitfalls of living in the boardroom or on the societal fringes. Devil Music may feel like an outlier in Bramblett's catalog, but restless experimentation has always been his trademark. The production, though far from slick, may initially startle, but through it, Bramblett reveals tradition to be a living, evolving process rather than a group of fixed archival notions.
**********
ABOUT THE ALBUM/OFFICIAL
Randall’s 10th release, Devil Music, pulls from a deep well. It embodies the authentic roots of American music, brilliantly blending them into this soul-drenched album. Special guests who appear on this are Mark Knopfler, Derek Trucks and Chuck Leavell. The title track refers to Howlin’ Wolf’s meeting with his estranged mother, who turned him away for playing “devil music.” He read that story in a book about Wolf and was able to ask Hubert Sumlin if it was true. He said it was and Wolf did cry all the way to Memphis. Some songs sprang from the tug-of-war between blues and religion, salvation and damnation. Bramblett says of this album. “It’s my experience of black and white culture in the south, and how it feels to grow up here with all the religion and pain and conflict and joy — and then there’s all that dancing…”
**********
OFFICIAL BIOGRAPHY
Randall Bramblett’s distinguished body of work is defined by a triple threat career as an acclaimed solo artist, an in-demand songwriter and a first call sideman. Among the artists who’ve recorded and performed Bramblett’s songs are Bettye LaVette, Hot Tuna, Delbert McClinton and most notably, Bonnie Raitt, who opened her 2014 Grammy winner, Slipstream, with one of his songs. In the ’70s he was a member of the seminal jazz/rock group Sea Level and as a sideman has toured with Gregg Allman, Widespread Panic and Levon Helm. Steve Winwood was such a fan of Bramblett’s keyboard, sax and vocal performances that he made Bramblett his go-to tour mate for 16 years, including the ’94 Traffic reunion.
But it’s Bramblett’s own career as frontman where his artistry is in full display. His experience as a band leader reaches back to his high school days in the railroad junction town of Jesup, Georgia, where Bramblett couldn’t help but absorb the field-rooted melodies and steel-wheeled rhythms he heard all around him. He fell in love with soul and R&B early, and was so attracted to the family piano that his parents let him start lessons at age 4 (his dad built extensions so he could reach the pedals). Guitar and sax came next and Bramblett began playing professionally while still in junior high. By the time he entered high school he was singing Temptations, Otis Redding and James Brown covers in a soul-funk band.
“We just wanted to do soul music because that’s what we all loved,” he recalls. “I used to listen to [Nashville-based] WLAC late at night because they played all this great soul and blues and R&B, and sermons and gospel music. That stuff just grabbed me and it still does.” His high school bandmates stuck together even after Bramblett went off to UNC Chapel Hill to college. “I’d be hitchhiking to Mississippi or Alabama for weekend shows and have to scramble to get back for Monday classes.”
In college he also started writing songs, influenced by Dylan and North Carolina native James Taylor. Moving to Athens, Georgia after graduation, he landed in the Capricorn Records house band and toured with Gregg Allman. In 1975 and ’76 he released his first two solo albums on Polydor. Shortly after he joined forces with Chuck Leavell and Sea Level.
“After Capricorn Records folded, Sea Level slowly fell apart and I kind of stopped everything for a few years. I cleaned up my act and eventually got invited to join Steve Winwood in ’88. Working with Steve gave me the confidence and energy to focus on songwriting again. I started part two of my solo career by recording See Through Me for a re-formed Capricorn Records in ’98,” explains Bramblett. “I’ve been focused on my own voice and songwriting since then. I always try to push the boundaries; it’s always exciting to see what will happen with each new recording.”
His latest New West release, the dark, Southern, soul-drenched Devil Music, is his sixth for the label and the tenth of his career. Like his others, it features compelling, unusually arranged melodies coupled with thoughtful, deftly worded lyrics.
The new recording features guitarist Derek Trucks whose dirtied-up slide counterpoints Bramblett’s falsetto in “Angel Child,” and keyboardist and fellow Sea Level alum, Chuck Leavell, who adds serious boogie to the witty “Reptile Pilot.” The guitar master, Mark Knopfler also makes a guest appearance and adds significantly on “Dead in the Water”—a swampy gem which definitely belongs on the soundtrack to an HBO series.
“When I wrote ‘Devil Music’ about Howlin’ Wolf’s meeting with his estranged mother, I knew I had the feel and the heart of the record. Songs like ‘Dead in the Water,’ ‘Whiskey Headed Woman’ and “Bottom of the Ocean” all sprang from the tug-of-war between blues and religion, salvation and damnation,” says Bramblett. “The overdriven vocal sound we used helped bring home the pain and defiance we wanted on these songs. The way I’m singing is more intense. The songs have this fundamental power that I just needed to express.”
In many songs, he says, “lost characters” abound. Some appear in the album opener and title track, while the aforementioned “Dead in the Water” was inspired by William S. Burroughs and his speed-freak wife (“scrubbin’ the floor with a toothbrush/but she just can’t get it clean”).
“It’s a picture of being stuck, whether it’s addiction or crime,” Bramblett explains. “There’s no resolution; you’re just dead in the water.”
The protagonist in “Angel Child” comically tries to lure a lover into the seedy web of his broken down life while the character in “Bottom of the Ocean” dreams of escape. These songs gain further impact from their construction and many are built around a single chord.
“Several of them are basically field songs where you’re coming down on the one like you’re chopping stuff, and you just stay there,” continues Bramblett. “The rest of the interest comes out of the ambient sounds, the lyrics and the inspiration of the players. The effect is trancelike; it pulls you in.”
Michael Rhodes who has played on most of Randall’s solo work helped arrange a series of sessions in Nashville at Sound Stage Studios with Chuck Ainlay, Ed Cherney, Elliot Scheiner, Frank Filopetti and George Massenburg.
“It was a fabulous experience working with these guys and they couldn’t have been more fun and supportive. My long time band mates, Davis Causey, Nick Johnson, Michael Steele and Gerry Hansen all came up from Athens to make this record,” recounts Bramblett. “We turned the place into a juke joint! Seth Hendershot, Tom Ryan and Kevin Hyde joined us to finish up overdubs at Gerry’s studio in Lawrenceville, Georgia.”
“I’m pullin’ from a deep well on this album,” Bramblett concludes. “It’s my experience of black and white culture in the south, and how it feels to grow up here with all the religion and pain and conflict and joy—and then there’s all that dancing…”
**********
BIOGRAPHY/AMG
Tim Griggs
Randall Bramblett is an accomplished singer/songwriter/multi-instrumentalist whose credits include work with Sea Level, Steve Winwood, Gregg Allman, Levon Helm and Robbie Robertson. Bramblett released his third solo album, See Through Me, in 1997, two decades after his previous solo release. During that 20-year period, Bramblett was a member of the Southern jazz fusion group Sea Level a touring member of the reunited Traffic, as well as a busy studio musician--epecially with Winwood. He was born in Jesup, Georgia, and heavily influenced by R&B music, gospel, blues, and folk. Bramblett plays keyboards, saxophones, guitar, mandolin, and harmonica. His songwriting is often moody and cinematic, as evidenced on albums for New West: 2001's No More Mr. Lucky, 2004's Thin Places, and 2006's Rich Someday. For 2008's Now It's Tomorrow, Bramblett wrote and arranged all the songs. It was the first time in the decade he'd worked without his friend and collaborator Davis Causey. He had written the songs piecemeal before entering the studio -- a first for him. Bramblett's "Used to Rule the World" appeared as the opening track on Bonnie Raitt's Grammy-winning Slipstream in 2012 (he also co-wrote "Down to You" with the artist and George Marinelli for that record). He also returned to recording that year. New West issued the all-original The Bright Spots in May of 2013. He spent the next year and a half touring and playing with his own band or as a guest at festivals, and was featured in the PBS Living Legends series. Bramblett reteamed with New West for 2015's Devil Music. The set featured guest spots from Mark Knopfler, Derek Trucks, and Chuck Leavell.
**********
BIOGRAPHY/WIKIPEDIA
**********
WEBSITE
**********
TO THE TOP
**********
