The Musical Box

the who: who's next (released july 1971)

Cut between two rock epics - Tommy and Quadrophenia - Who’s Next was pulled from the wreckage of a third (Lifehouse) and transformed The Who from a ‘60s mod pop troupe to a worldly rock enterprise. Leading the charge was a My Generation anthem for a new generation, Won’t Get Fooled Again. Its finale lyric became one of the most sobering social verses of its day (”Meet the new boss; same as the old boss”). Baba O’Riley with its “teenage wasteland’ chorus and the savage introspection of Behind Blue Eyes made Who’s Next a staple on rock radio. Baba O’Riley and Won’t Get Fooled Again live on today as themes to two CSI series. But the neglected Pete Townshend gems The Song is Over and Getting in Tune underscore the emancipating drive of The Who’s finest hour.

Among the curiosities worth viewing at the Forecastle Festival website (www.forecastlefest.com) is a little video journey called Forecastle Then. It begins in 2002, when the music, arts and activism gathering was little more than a community event in Louisville’s Tyler Park.

The then-inaugural festival had little by way of stage or lighting and relied mostly on park grounds and picnic tables for audience seating. It played to a few handfuls of fans, many of which were simply bewildered park patrons. There is an especially telling shot of a park youth curiously standing beside a drummer as he performed.

The festival’s initial budget that year was under $500.

The montage sits next to a second video chapter aptly titled Forecastle Now. It recaps last year’s three-day gathering at the Louisville Belvedere. You get to see the massive stage set up at the foot of the Galt House along with glimpses of fans spread all over the festival grounds along Main Street and the nearby Ohio River.

There were also symposiums on everything from filmmaking to green technology. And there was music - tons of it - from the blue ribbon bluegrass of The Del McCoury Band to the indie rock of Dr. Dog and more.

Forecastle sets sail again this weekend, a few weeks ahead of last year’s late July voyage. The destination is again the Belvedere. True to its growth cycle, the lineup promises what will likely be the most majestic Forecastle yet, with tickets for just-before-midnight concerts aboard the Belle of Louisville on Friday and Saturday going for as little as $10 and $15 respectively. Three day festival passes are a beefier $100. Single day admission to Forecastle is $40

The festival’s keynote speaker this year will be Christopher Childs, a veteran energy/environmental activist and former national speaker for Greenpeace USA. His talk will be presented at 2:30 p.m. Sunday. Representatives from The Sierra Club, The Appalachian Trail Conservatory and 35 other environmental groups, along with a bio-fueled, interactive caravan of artists, worldbeat musicians, puppeteers, activists and even culinary artists called The Sustainable Living Roadshow will also be on hand for this year’s Forecastle.

As always, though, the music assembled by festival founder JK McKnight and crew is the main draw. Here is a sampling of a few of the major acts on tap to play at Forecastle this weekend.

+ Widespread Panic - The champion Athens, Ga. jam band will headline with a pair of two-set, three hour performances on Saturday and Sunday evenings. Guitarist John Bell and company have been fashioning studio albums out of a groove-savvy sound for over two decades (the mostly recent being 2008’s Free Somehow). But like most jam-oriented ensembles, Widespread Panic’s reputation stems from its live shows. As such, the band actively releases archival concert recordings on its own label. The newest, which hit stores in June, is the three-disc Huntsville 1996. (8 p.m. Saturday and Sunday).

+ The Black Crowes - The seemingly tireless Crowes remain in flight with brothers Chris and Rich Robinson at the helm. While its music has moved away from the R&B/rock matrix of its early recordings, the band still relishes hearty jams built around earthy rock and soul. Like Widespread Panic, longstanding commercial popularity has eluded the band. Similarly, the Crowes have long acknowledged its place in the jam band market by following its last three studio albums with concert recordings. The most recent of the latter, Warpaint Live, was released in April. Never ones to sit still for long, the Crowes already have two new albums, Before the Frost… and …Until the Freeze, ready for release in September. Both are studio recordings, but were recorded live in front of a small, invited audience at Levon Helm’s Woodstock, New York studios. (6:45 p.m. Saturday).

+ The Black Keys - From the Black Crowes, Forecastle goes to the Black Keys, the ever industrious Akron, Ohio guitar/bass duo specializing in primal, neo-psychedelic boogie, rock and blues. The band is like a modern variation of Cream. Sort of. Guitarist/vocalist Dan Auerbach and drummer Patrick Carney built nicely upon that sound with last year’s ultra cool, Danger Mouse-produced Attack and Release album. Auerbach also issued an impressive solo debut called Keep It Hid in February. For my money, though, the Black Keys never sounded better than on 2006’s Chulahoma, a six song disc of music by one of the band’s biggest influences, the late Mississippi bluesman Junior Kimbrough. (11 tonight).

+ The Avett Brothers - How big will the Avetts’ Forecastle outing be? Well, the trio (and sometimes quartet, when cellist Joe Kwon sits in) played here to an enraptured, sold out Kentucky Theatre audience just over two weeks ago. So bank on the Forecastle outing being huge. As with the Lexington show, guitarist Seth Avett, banjoist Scott Avett and bassist Bob Crawford will offer roughed up string band sounds - bluegrass and pre-bluegrass music with a punkish, barrelhouse makeover, if you will. And along with music from the band’s popular indie recordings on the Ramseur label will be previews of new songs off of the upcoming, Rick Rubin-produced I and Love and You album. A free download of the record’s elegant piano-and-string-laden title tune has just been made available on the Avetts’ website (www.theavettbrothers.com). (7 p.m. Sunday).

+ Zappa Plays Zappa - The guitar rock-oriented compositions of the late and very great Frank Zappa live on in this three year old tribute ensemble led by son Dweezil Zappa. The younger Zappa is no slouch on guitar himself, as shown by a self-titled 2008 CD/DVD of the band in performance. ZPZ continues in 2009 with a new lead singer by the name of Ben Thomas, an unknown to almost everyone - including, initially, those within the Zappa camp. A singer from the Northern suburbs of Chicago, Thomas was auditioned and passed Dweezil Zappa’s primary requirements as posted recently on the ZPZ website: “He has a passport and is free for the next five weeks… oh yeah, and the fact that he walked in and nailed Inca Roads.” (8 tonight).

Other performers at this weekend’s Forecastle Festival include Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit, The Whigs and Cage the Elephant (today); The Detroit Cobras, Man Man and The New Mastersounds (Saturday); and Yonder Mountain String Band, Umphrey’s McGee and Backyard Tire Fire (Sunday).

The Forecastle Festival runs today through Sunday at the Louisville Belvedere. Tickets range from $10 to $100 and are available through TicketMaster at (800) 745-3000.

The Musical Box will be closed for a few days while we’re off on some Falstaff-ian adventures in the Arboretum with Henry IV, Part I. Do join us.

We’ll be back in the Box by the weekend with an overview of the Forecastle Festival in Louisville, our latest Summer Album of the Week and some suggestions of music to study Shakespeare by. Cheerio till then.

levon helm: electric dirt

The triumph behind Levon Helm’s wonderful 2007 Dirt Farmer album wasn’t the fact that it helped put a Grammy in the hands of the former drummer, mandolinist and co-vocalist for The Band. The prize it gave to everyone was the return of Helm’s singing voice - a rural, potent vocal instrument of Southern design that had been largely silenced in preceding years during a battle with throat cancer. But Helm prevailed. First he assembled a band made up of performers that assisted with the fabled Midnight Ramble concerts staged at his Woodstock, New York recording studios. Then he returned to active recording duty with an album that championed the folk and country roots aspects of The Band’s mighty Americana journey. The Grammy was simply a bonus.

That was less than two years ago. Now we have Electric Dirt, an album we might be led to believe is more of a rock ‘n roll outing. And in some ways, it is. But it conveys rock inspirations the way Dirt Farmer leaned on pre-bluegrass country muses. Electric Dirt’s feel is loose, soulful and ceaselessly earnest, as in the way The Grateful Dead’s mischievous Tennessee Jed is reborn with a huge percussive strut reminiscent of vintage Little Feat. But above it all is that reconstituted voice - a proud, exuberant singing implement that reflects a smidgen of age (at 69, Helm is entitled) even though the sheer gusto and vigor of his vocal work is positively ageless.

That’s especially true of Helm’s take on Randy Newman’s Kingfish. When Newman sang the Huey Long-inspired tune on his classic 1974 album Gold Old Boys, the music couldn’t help but sound sardonic. In Helm’s hands, Kingfish becomes more playful with singing that reaches for the heavens just as profoundly as when he made those boundless vocal leaps with The Band on Ophelia nearly 35 years ago.

Helm has some able help on Electric Dirt, too - namely, the very complimentary production of Larry Campbell, stirring harmonies from Ollabelle’s Amy Helm (the singer’s daughter) and Teresa Williams (Campbell’s wife) and, most of all, horn arrangements full of Louisiana soul by Allen Toussaint. In addition to being one of New Orleans’ most celebrated musical elders, Toussaint scored horn charts for The Band on its extraordinary 1972 concert album Rock of Ages.

Roots generations happily collide from there. Helm takes on a pair of mandolin charged Muddy Waters gems, Stuff You Gotta Watch (which he previously covered on the underrated 1993 Band reunion album Jericho) and You Can’t Lose What You Never Had. Father-and-daughter Helm later turn Ollabelle’s Heaven’s Pearls into a suitably sanctified family hymn with Ollabelle bassist Byron Isaacs adding both to the tune’s plaintive cast and the entire album’s rootsy drive.

If there was a pick of this righteous crop, though, the honor would go to I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel to be Free, the popular spiritual first cut in 1967 by Nina Simone (it has been revisited more recently by such varied artists as Solomon Burke and Derek Trucks). With another Toussaint horn arrangement backing him up, Helm sings of emancipation and jubilation in equal terms. But one can’t help but think the song possesses a more personal resolve for Helm, as well. “I sing because I know I would see you,” he shouts with reverence in the last verse. Given how this voice couldn’t sing at all until a few years ago, the restorative energy of this music is all the more remarkable just as the dirt under its muddy, rootsy boots is all the more electric.

michael jackson in 1988.

That public reaction to the death 12 days ago of Michael Jackson has been so overwhelming is, quite unexpectedly, a surprise.

Admittedly, the kinds of record sales and commercial popularity Jackson enjoyed 25 years ago were unrivalled. Few artists of any genre since then have matched such success in any sustained way.  But Jackson has not released an album in eight years. Nor has he seen one of his singles crack the Billboard Top 5 since 1995. Add to that the legal and personal woes that have played out publicly like the worst kinds of reality TV and you wonder how his fandom has remained so secure for so long.

But it has. Jackson has been mourned internationally over the past week and a half in manners that aren’t accorded to heads of state. In my lifetime, the only public figures to draw such attention at the times of their deaths were John Kennedy, Elvis Presley and Princess Diana.

Jackson fans, it seems, prefer to remember him mostly for his music, which is probably all for the best. When we put beloved public figures - be they from political, religious or entertainment arenas - under microscopes and peer into their lives outside of the spotlight, we are almost guaranteed to be mortified by what we see. It’s just that nothing about Jackson was subtle - not his professional accomplishments and certainly not the failings of a personal life that became very public. If fans can see past all of the latter, more power to them.

I saw Jackson perform once. Herald-Leader staff writer Beverly Fortune and I covered his March 1988 concert at Louisville’s Freedom Hall. At the time, Jackson’s Bad album was eight months old. He hit the stage amid a wall of lights for Wanna Be Startin’ Something, sang under dancing lasers for a curious cover of Heartbreak Hotel and grooved as a costumed gangster against the friendly gunfire of Smooth Criminal. The band was bright and huge with a then-unknown Sheryl Crow as backup singer. But the show was also all business - a cumulative reflection of a lifelong song-and-dance man trying to keep step with a career that seemed to know no commercial bounds.

The Jackson song popping into my head the most in recent days is the Bad hit Man in the Mirror. It was arguably the most affirmative tune he recorded. It was a call for personal change and betterment - a call one could only have hoped Jackson could have better held onto to himself.

Now, 10 days later, the ugly truths and fables begin to crawl to the surface. There will be battles over his estate and his children as well as endless controversies as to how he lived his life. It will be the media freak show of the century, the kind of unending deconstruction of a career that is likely to test the faith of his most ardent fans.

Those that still champion his music have already spoken. Three Jackson albums (a pair of compilations and 1982’s iconic Thriller) took the top positions of last week’s Billboard Comprehensive Albums chart bumping The Black Eyed Peas, The Jonas Brothers and Eminem out of contention.

But for those of us already weary of the media carnival that always seems to surround Jackson, the worst is undoubtedly to come. The last 15 years of Jackson’s life were indeed freakish. But they will be nothing compared to the first 15 years of his death.

creedence clearwater revival: cosmo's factory (released june 1970)

This was the first album I ever bought. By the time I had saved up the funds to pay the exorbitant $3.47 price tag, Cosmo’s Factory was already on its third hit single. The more progressive radio stations of the time, though, had moved on to the band’s swampy, 11 minute reworking of the Motown hit I Heard It Through the Grapevine. John Fogerty and CCR hit on all cylinders with this one. Who’ll Stop the Rain and Lookin’ Out My Back Door were pure homespun fancy, Run Through the Jungle and the killer non-single album opener Ramble Tamble embraced psychedelia and Long As I Can See the Light was so full of gospel fire that Cosmo’s Factory nearly broke into the R&B Top 10.  Through it all, Fogerty’s boogeyman-on-holiday voice led the charge. A complete classic.

Few businesses throw open their doors for live music during summer holidays quite the way that our pals at CD Central do. But for the Fourth, the festivities head downtown - specifically, Phoenix Park - for its annual Independent Music on Independence Day celebration.

This year, the predominantly local lineup includes the electronic soundscapes of Casino Versus Japan (10:30 a.m.), pop stylist Matt Duncan (12 noon) and pop rock fave Chico Fellini (1 p.m.). The music takes a break at 2 p.m. for the downtown parade and resumes with Nashville jam band Moon Taxi (3:15 p.m.). Independent Music on Independence Day concludes with the neo-minimalist sound sculptures of Lexington’s Tiny Fights (4:30 p.m.).

WRFL-FM and The Morris Book Shop are co-sponsors with CD Central of the event. For more information, call (859) 233-3472.

holly williams performs as part of the annual July 4th celebration red, white and boom - an event that just happens to be headlined this year by her father, hank williams, jr. photo by autumn dewilde.

Take a look at the promotion Holly Williams has undertaken since her new Here With Me album hit stores two weeks ago.

She has performed on The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien, played San Francisco’s prestigious Fillmore club and received glowing reviews from The New York Times and Chicago Sun-Times. Not exactly the flight pattern a country artist normally takes when releasing a new record.

But then, who said Williams is a country artist? Sure, there is the undeniable heritage to consider. The iconic Hank Williams is her grandfather, the rowdier and rockier Hank Williams Jr. is her dad and country/metal hybrid Hank III is her half-brother. And, yes, when you notice how the singer is being marketed (her label is Mercury Nashville) and the artists she is opening for this summer (Sugarland being at the top of the list), you can’t help but think country is unquestionably her calling.

“What I do is still singer-songwriter music, though,” said Williams who returns to Lexington this weekend to perform as part of the Red, White and Boom celebration downtown - a Fourth of July event, by the way, that will be headlined by father Hank Jr. “So I hope country music has a place for a female singer-songwriter.

“I mean, there is no Mary Chapin Carpenter, no Emmylou Harris on country radio right now filling that void. I would like to do that. But I would also still hope to play on a Steve Earle tour and than maybe a Keith Urban tour. At the end of the day, I’m singing these simple songs that I feel can be played to any audience.”

The tune that sits at the stylistic crossroads of Here With Me is Mama. Lord knows there have been enough tunes written for country music mothers over the years, although most have been penned from a male perspective. Williams’ song is more of a family matter. Its inspiration draws from childhood years when the singer’s father was away touring, leaving mother Becky Williams as the primary inspiration - musical and otherwise.

“My dad was touring 300 nights a year when we were young. We knew he loved us, but sometimes we would go two months without seeing him. So my mom was my everyday influence - even from a musical standpoint. She would play classical piano every night and was always singing in the house. She also always had this incredibly positive attitude. My parents eventually split, but she never talked down about my dad. So this was my thank you song to her.”

In the five years since the release of Williams’ debut album, The Ones We Never Knew, there was a major life interruption - specifically, a severe automobile crash in 2006 that also involved sister Hilary Williams. The experience is reflected on a Here With Me song titled Without Jesus Here With Me. The title suggests where her inspiration came from. But there was another influence at work - that of Hank Williams Sr., the grandfather she never met.

“Hank’s words taught me everything,” Williams sings. “Thank God I saw the light for me.”

“The accident wasn’t necessarily life changing in a spiritual sense,” Williams said. “I was raised in the church. But from a personal standpoint, when you’re in the hospital for a long time, you realize how much in your life you take for granted. I had broken bones in my arms and wrists but, really, I was spared physically. If you saw what happened to my car you wouldn’t imagine being able to come out of that in one piece.”

Ironically, Williams tends to distance herself professionally - but not personally - from father Hank Jr. these days in order to enforce the stylistic differences in their music. This summer, maintaining separate camps has been tough. For example, Here With Me was released the same day as a new Hank Williams Jr. album titled 127 Rose Avenue. And then there is the little matter of father and daughter Williams winding up - albeit in different sets - at Red, White and Boom.

“Musically, I don’t think there is a role for him to play with my music other than just being a supportive dad. We have always kept our musical lives unbelievably separate.

“In the beginning, I found clubs to play on my own, I found management on my own and I made Nashville contacts on my own. It was never like we were at some record company party with dad introducing me. He would never go to any of those parties anyway.

“So being on the same bill in Lexington is just a random thing, really. Every now and then I’ll get onstage and sing Family Tradition with him. Mostly though, he’s not giving me any more advice than any father would give their kid.”

Red, White and Boom begins at 4 p.m. on July 4 at the Cox St. parking lot behind Rupp Arena. Gates open at 3 p.m. Tickets are $20, $40 and $98. Call (800) 745-3000.

bill mallonee, right, with wife and performance partner muriah rose.

At the close on our interview, Americana songsmith Bill Mallonee apologized for not speaking in “short, pithy sentences.”

As a wildly prolific solo artist as well as the past and present chieftain of the newly reformed Athens, Ga. collective Vigilantes of Love, Mallonee was genuinely concerned. Yes, he spoke politely in lengthy, detailed narratives about his philosophies of music, his life in music and the very music itself, which accumulates at such a staggering rate that Mallonee needs multiple myspace pages and websites to make it all available.

But maybe the main reason Mallonee, who returns to Lexington on Wednesday for a performance at The Dame, has so much to say about his music is because the music itself is so worth talking about in the first place.

“I’m a real believer in the idea that if you love something, you just do it for the passion and not necessarily for the coins,” Mallonee said. “I mean, obviously, you don’t want to be living under a bridge, although we’ve come close to that over the past few years. But then, I’m 25 albums into this working life. I don’t even know if I can actually do anything else.”

Mallonee released his first Vigilantes of Love album, the indie project Jugular, in 1990. His first solo record, Fetal Position, followed two years later. The musicians he teamed with came from the fertile Athens music scene, entering and exiting his projects in revolving door fashion. His music reflected, in varying degrees, a soon-to-be flourishing alt-country movement, a solid Christian faith and an epic folk-rock album that continues to inspire him to this day.

“I always harken back to one of my favorite acoustic rock records, Neil Young’s Harvest. I’ve probably listened to that 1,000 times. I still put it on and am still moved by it.

“The lineups of the Vigilantes were revolving door in nature right from the very beginning. The version, I guess most people would remember is the one that played on the album we made with Buddy Miller, Audible Sigh. That was back in ‘99. We made a few records after that were very grounded in two guitars-bass-and-drums Americana stuff.

While Athens musicians stocked Mallonee’s rotating roster of bandmates, the city’s fabled music scene was essentially indifferent to his music at first.

“There wasn’t much superstructure in Athens for a band to get of town when Vigilantes first hit. We couldn’t get a date to play at the 40 Watt Club (the reknown Athens music haven), so we started playing out of town. We signed our deal in Austin and then hit radio in Atlanta shortly after that. Then the main clubs here in Athens said, ‘Oh, you’ve got to play here.’ Local scenes can be really fickle.”

Commerical success never fully greeted Vigilantes although albums like 1995’s Blister Soul (the finest of its major label recordings for Capricorn) and Audible Sigh earned Mallonee considerable critical praise. But after 2001’s more psychedelically inclined Summershine went largely unpromoted, Mallonee and the band called it a day.

“We were out there doing 180 shows a year, just four guys in a van. It became a formula for demoralization.”

For the following six years, Mallonee stepped up his ultra-indie solo career, writing songs at a more furious pace while touring as an acoustic duo with his wife, one time Lexingtonian Muriah Rose.

In recent years, Mallonee has issued demo-style EP discs of his songs on his website (www.billmallonee.com) as well as on a myspace page under the project name Works Progress Administration. The former also boasts a 2009 live recording by the reformed Vigilantes that features country inclined versions of Blister Soul and String of Pearls as well as a cover of Neil Young’s Harvest gem Out on the Weekend.

 ”I guess I just wanted to play in a band again,” Mallonee said of returning Vigilantes to active duty. “I wanted to see what would happen, but I wasn’t holding my breath as to whether the music would actually gel or anything.

“I even went ahead and booked a gig before we ever started rehearsing. I’m not saying that the show was all that tight. But it was fun. After we all got back in the van, I asked, ‘Well, do you want to this again.’ And everybody said ‘Sure.’”

+ + + +

Wednesday’s Dame concert was originally to be a Vigilantes show but has been re-scheduled as a double bill performance featuring Mallonee and Rose with Texas song stylist Guy Forsyth. Tickets for the 8 p.m. performance are $7. Call (859) 231-7263.