the 941

No matter how hard we might try, family gatherings and holiday season don’t always add up to joyous — or even peaceful — experiences. But when the Trucks clan joined forces for their Soul Stew Revival bash at Tampa Theatre on Monday, a near capacity crowd of around 1,400 witnessed domestic bliss at its finest. The jubilant vibe, marked by expert musicianship, permeated the ancient venue. If the rumors are true about the historic movie house being haunted, even the ghosts must have been grinning.

The gnat’s-ass-tight gang of musicians mesmerized with gorgeous executions of the timeworn tension-and-release dynamic. It’s a God-send rooted in the churches of the Deep South, one that was sold with aplomb to the secular world by the likes of Ray Charles, James Brown and Aretha Franklin. The Allman Brothers Band, Derek Trucks’ chief employer, then expanded the sonic presentation with Kind of Blue-indebted jazz elements in the late 1960s. Decades later, the holy tradition thrives, coming together wonderfully Monday night at Tampa Theatre.

Trucks, a 29-year-old slide guitar master, and his band, were joined by his soul singing (and pretty damn good ax player herself) wife Susan Tedeschi for an awesomely old-school R&B revue goosed with jam band touches. A three-man horn section, two drummers (one being Derek’s younger bro Duane), a percussionist, bassist and keyboardist who doubled as a flautist for one number (think Astral Weeks and save the Jethro Tull jokes) filled the stage. The formidable ensemble, which featured members of Tedeschi’s and Trucks’ individual bands, melded terrifically.

Photo of Tedeschi and Trucks, from a previous performance, courtesy of Flickr.

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AC/DC, which plays the St. Pete Times Forum on Sun. Dec. 21, is one of the few classic rock acts that steadfastly refuses to peddle the obligatory “greatest hits” CD — or offer their music as digital downloads, for that matter. And I’m proud of my hard rock heroes for not selling out … Well, for not selling out to anybody except Walmart, with which the band did do a most dirty deed.

Anyway, if AC/DC ever OKs a best-of CD, I want to produce the compilation. Here’s how it would go: 18 tracks in chronological order spanning the years 1976 to 2008, with nine songs each for singers Bon Scott and Brian Johnson. The disc has been quite popular with my friends and coworkers — yes, I’ve made several. The Johnson tracks and greatest 1970s promo music video ever(!) after the jump.

AC/DC: Greatest Hits

1. “It’s a Long Way to the Top (If You Wanna Rock ‘N Roll)”
2. “T.N.T.”
3. “Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap”
4. “Big Balls”
5. “Let There Be Rock”
6. “Whole Lotta Rosie”
7. “Rock ‘N Roll Damnation”
8. “Highway to Hell”
9. “Girls Got Rhythm”

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Former Smith and indie boy icon Morrissey will bring his melodramatic croon and hopeless romanticism to Jannus Landing on March 4. Tickets go on sale Friday, Dec. 19 at 10am through Ticketmaster, or charge by phone at 800-745-3000. Moz will begin the U.S. leg of his world tour in support of his new album, Years of Refusal, this February. Morrissey will be backed by his longtime band including Boz Boorer, Jesse Tobias, Matt Walker and Solomon Walker. Video clip after the jump.

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I usually don’t give a shit about the Grammys but must admit I was thrilled to find this email in my inbox this morning. I have been gushing about M.I.A. for some time and it seems mainstream audiences didn’t get around to her killer, genre-hopping, world-flavored, lady gangsta single “Paper Planes,” and the equally awesome album Kala, until the song was used recently in the Pineapple Express trailer. Perhaps exposure on the Grammys broadcast — somebody still watches, right? — will increase her profile. M.I.A. is one of the most exciting and brilliant young artists on the global stage. She should be playing arenas not tiny little sold-out clubs on Frenchmen Street, which was the case this year at New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival.

Here’s my review of Kala, which topped my Top 10 Albums of 2007 tally.

“Paper Planes” went No. 1 on my Top 30 Songs of 2007 list.

Here’s the press release:

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James McMurtry and the Heartless Bastards w/Ronny Elliott Band, 8 p.m. Fri., Dec. 5, Skipper’s Smokehouse, Tampa, $17 advanced, $20 door. Photo Craig Seth.

James McCurtry might not be a name on par with, say, fellow Texans Lyle Lovett or Steve Earle, but the singer/songwriter and bad-ass guitarist is still a revered act in the Americana world. McCurtry’s latest album, the outstandingly incendiary, darkly humorous, wonderfully emotive and rustically rocking Just Us Kids, has garnered glowing write-ups in glossies such as Blender, Mojo and Entertainment Weekly, the latter of which showered the disc with superlatives like “brilliant,” “hilarious” and “poignant” in giving it an A- grade. Just Us Kids is selling, too. It has reached a very respectable No. 18 on Billboard’s Top Independent Albums chart.

So it’s surprising when I’m given McMurtry’s mobile phone number and instructed to ring him in the afternoon. Any afternoon. Easy as that, the PR person says. But I’m skeptical. Usually when dealing with an artist of McMurtry’s status there’s a set time, date and minute count to which, you, the interviewer, are supposed to stick. Twenty minutes is the norm.

I dial the digits and hear a gruff “hello” that could only be James McMurtry’s. “Give me a moment to pull over,” he says. “I’ve got a manual transmission.” He steers his automobile into a nearby parking lot to grant an interview on a recent Tuesday afternoon. McMurtry has been driving around his hometown of Austin, running the same mundane errands you or I might conduct on an off day. He good-naturedly refers to the interview as just another duty after I apologize for interrupting his daily routine.

The Americana music icon speaks slowly. His voice is deep. His answers are straightforward and marked by an economy of words – and a drawl that reflects both his native Virginia and decades spent in the Lone Star State. You get the sense he’s incapable of feeding you bullshit, and it’s the same way with his music. Whether recounting the machinations of a crystal meth cooker in the fan favorite “Choctaw Bingo,” or telling me how his world-famous father Larry McMurtry’s one shortcoming as a novelist/screenwriter is that “he always gets firearms wrong,” the younger McMurtry’s words smack of integrity.

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Thanksgiving Weekend just didn’t provide enough do-nothing time for me so I decided to take this entire week off and have me a stay-cation. I’m going to re-alphabetize my CD collection, dust my apartment, finish a couple books, write haikus and whatever else I feel like doing. Which will surely include some light blogging. Here are the tunes going through my head:

Top 10: Vacation songs

1. Vacation, The Go-Go’s
2. Holiday Road, Lindsey Buckingham
3. Fish and Whistle, John Prine
4. Too Much of Nothing, Bob Dylan and the Band
5. It’s My Lazy Day, Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard
6. Situation Vacant, The Kinks
7. Lazy Days, The Byrds
8. One Big Holiday, My Morning Jacket
9. Home Sweet Home, Breaux Freres
10. Another Sunny Day, Belle & Sebastian

The Go-Go’s — Vacation

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The most hyped record in rock history begins with a big noise — but it’s ultimately more of a whimper than a bang. The opening title-track amounting to a Pro Tools mess of guitar processing that pours out of the speakers loud and hard but never rocks, never swings, never grabs you the way, say, the entire first side of Appetite for Destruction did. Axl Rose’s voice, though, remains an awesomely sadistic growl, a reminder that, yes, it has truly been missed during the past 15 years.

Chinese Democracy improves with the industrial-informed freak out “Shackler’s Revenge” and again with the muscular guitar kiss-off “Better” – because no one delivers bitter quite like Axl. The same theme is explored on the power ballad “Street of Dreams” (previously leaked as “The Blues”). Keyboards, strings, face-melting guitar solos (courtesy of both Buckethead and Robin Finkck), it’s Axl, the music mad man genius at his post-modern Wall of Sound best. The only bummer is when the singer dips into his lower register. I can’t help but hear Forgetting Sarah Marshall’s “Dracula’s Lament.”

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Singer/songwriter extraordinaire Geri X is freezing her ass off in Wisconsin and has decided to return to Tampa Bay— permanently.

Which makes us very happy.

“So, we are coming home for good in December,” she says via email. ” 24HR Service Station records signed us and we are doing some work with John Wesley at Red Room Recorders working on the next CD. We’ll be releasing it Jan. 16 at State Theater.”

Have Gun, Will Travel, The Beauvilles and Vega Star, of Wisconsin, are also scheduled to be on the Jan. 16 roster.

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