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REISSUES: NEW THEN. NEW AGAIN
IMKSPREM PANIC
Choice Cuts: The Capricorn Years: 1991-1999
Volcano/ Legacy
Widespread Panic's tenure with Southern rock
flagship label Capricorn is highlighted on the
band's first "best of' comp. Choice Cuts presents
highlights from the band/ label partnership that
saw the Athens-based Panic go from soulful,
blues-infused bar band to beloved successors of
the working-man's-touring-band throne left va
cant by the departed Grateful Dead.
Far from an anthology, Choice Cuts does com
pile a weighty sampling of favorites and deep
cuts from the band's decade-long (1988 through
'99) run with Capricorn. It also presents, more
often than not, the band's most familiar lineup—
vocalist John Bell, gui
tarist Michael Houser,
bassist Dave Schools, key
boardist Jojo Hermann,
percussionist Domingo
Ortiz and drummer Todd
Nance—which provides
a thread of connectivity
throughout.
From the
slow'n'psychedelic "Papa's
Home" and the ragtime-
bent "Blue Indian" to
the near sinister, Vic
Chesnutt-assisted "Aunt
Avis," Team Widespread
incorporates stinging
blues, hippie folk, bottom-heavy R&B and more
into the hand-picked song selection. The disc
also includes two from the free 1998 Panic In the
Streets concert that drew an estimated 100,000
fans to downtown Athens. This is far from a de
finitive document of the band's past, but a sub
stantial and lingering taste nonetheless.
ROBYN HITCHCOCK
Jewels for Sophia
Storefront Hitchcock
Noble Rot
Two late-'90s releases from eccentric British
singer-songwriter and former Athens resident
Robyn Hitchcock have been reintroduced to the
assembly line. Storefront Hitchcock, from 1998,
was the soundtrack to the Jonathan Demme-
directed performance film of the same name,
which found mad hatter of surrealist Brit-folk
Hitchcock performing deep cuts aplenty and let
ting his tongue run amok with a string of ram
bling, at times hilarious, song intros and spoken
word pieces.
The album's stripped-down setting—Hitch
cock solo most times, accompanied intermit
tently by guitarist Tim Keegan and violin player
Deni Bonet—allows the copious hooks and finely
etched lyricism of Hitchcock's songs to flourish
on tracks like "1974," which includes a sharply
penned homage to Sid Barrett, and the waltzing
"Let's Go Thundering." Not only are "spleens a-
go-go" here, as tossed out during one of the al
bum's most unpredictable spoken interludes, but
Hitchcock's distinct, gleefully-warped take on life
gone awry is splattered all across the windshield
of this thing.
Jewels for Sophia, from 1999, presents
Hitchcock for the most part with full band and
with his film noir-style songwriting powers in
tact. The album slipped underneath the radar
upon its initial release, often casting off com
parisons to 1996's more stable Moss Elixir. Jewels
for Sophia is typically schizophrenic Hitchcock,
however. If one can overlook its unhinged-
but-ambitious scope, the album reveals itself
as a rewarding escapade through gems like the
subdued, wistfully plucked "You've Got a Sweet
Mouth On You Baby," the hilarious and hidden
"Don't Talk To Me About Gene Hackman" and the
sardonic post-grunge rave up "Viva Sea-Tac."
Together, Jewels and Storefront are highly recom
mended blueprints for aspiring madcaps and sur
realist language dissectors everywhere.
BOBBY BARE
Bobby Bare Sings Lullabys,
Legends and Lies (And More)
RCA Nashville/ Legacy
A song about building a mechanical girl
friend, several about tall tale legends like Paul
Bunyan and Marie Lavaux, plus a defiant yarn
spun by a loser who must win at all costs can all
be found on Bobby Bare Sings Lullabys, Legends
and Lies. The album marked the start of a pro
lific partnership between
folk-country troubadour
Bare and freewheeling
songwriter-author Shel
Silverstein.
Originally released
in 1973, Lullabys broke
the dress code for most
Nashville recordings of
its time. It was a double
album, a rarity in the
country music world
even today, recorded in
front of a real live studio
audience of family and
rowdy friends. The songs
are some of Bare's most
quintessential—the wily "Sure Hit Songwriter's
Pen," the sentimental "Daddy What If" featuring
a young pre-curl Bobby Bare Jr. assisting—as
well as some of Silverstein's most endearing and
imaginative work.
This And More edition adds an extra disc's
worth of Silverstein/ Bare collaborations that
document what kind of mischief the pair raised
in the years following the album's initial re
lease. The extra disc makes for a complete ad
ditional chapter in itself, highlighted by live
favorite "Tequila Sheila," "Food Blues" and a
couple ("S100,000 in Pennies" and "Back Home
In Huntsville Again") from 1975's equally solid
pairing Hard Time Hungrys. With this long-out-of
print classic restored and re-upped, one can only
hope the blue collar, unemployment line-themed
Hungrys won't be far behind.
THE DYNAMICS
First Landing
Hacktone
First Landing was the first of two releases
by obscure R&B vocal middleweight act The
Dynamics. Originally released in 1969—several
years after the footprints of soul/ R&B labels
like Stax and Motown had already been set in
stone—the album comes across as a band at
tempting to meld the distinct flavors epitomized
by those two imprints.
Isaac "Zeke" Harris, George White, Zerben
Hicks, Fred Baker and Samuel Stevenson were,
indeed, from Detroit, so the personable Motown
touch can definitely be felt on the driving
"Dum-de-Dum" and the Smokey & the Miracles-
influenced "What Would I Do." The muscular
guitar, brass and organ leads that personified
Southern-style R&B are spattered across the al
bum as well. First Landing was a well-performed,
solid first outing from the all-but-forgotten
Dynamics, who would have one more shot, 1973's
What a Shame, left in them before laying down
their spirited collective groove for good.
Michael Andrews
Redux Nation is a monthly column focusing on album
reissues, repackagings and box sets.
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NEWS & FEATURES I ARTS & EVENTS I MOVIES I MUSIC I COMICS & ADVICE I CLASSIFIEDS AUGUST 15, 2007 • FLAGPOLE.COM 47