Music Heals By Mad Dog Blues

 

Music Heals

By

Mad Dog Blues

Written by

Steve Sheppard

 

It’s great to welcome back one of the most unique artists on the block with a new release, no one gets your creative juices going quite like Mad Dog Blues, and this new release called Music Heals is in my view is one of the most outstanding of their career, this is a journey through a multi-instrumental world of blues you will never want to end.

Music Heals is a 12 track release that offers much; the artists are Jeff Becker on mandolin, Clark Chanslor on bass, and Mad Dog Friedman on harmonica and wooden flutes, and Mark Kaczorowski on slide and acoustic guitar, also featured are Bill Pontarelli on clarinet, Ellen Rice on cello, Lonesome Rolan on keyboard, and Jonathan Sadler on marimba. This entire group blend together something remarkable and deeply interesting.

Blues roots, moments of improvisational genius can be found here, with a little Native American flute and harmonica, and some ambient and spiritual soundscapes too, making this band utterly unique in every way, pieces like Clarks Dream offer up a special slice of roots to get hooked onto, whilst offerings like Shortnin' Bread & Jam gift the listener a little boogie into the mix as well, with some traditional 3 chord magic and a sumptuous harmonica, the additional mandolin work of Jeff Becker was a crafted moment of class in this uplifting offering.

However my personal favourite would be the title track, Friedman on Native Flute was in sublime form, the accompanying guitar and the minor chords and notes manifested for me, one of the best tracks the artist has ever created in my view, and easily the most beautiful and rhythmic, kudos to the band here.

The release continues with pieces like the rag styled Some of These Days, and then onto Agua Es Vida (Water is life) more textured native flute from the master Friedman, creating a compelling truism. Further into this 12 track release pieces like Nobody Knows You When You Are Down and out, forms a more traditional blues ethic in its arrangement, while La Rosita entertains the listener with a little acoustic blues with Latin-influenced feeling.

There literally is something for everyone on this album, like Romance in Five, this is a fascinating offering as most blues songs use 4/4 time, but a 5-beat rhythm gives the music a slightly unusual, flowing feel and it truly works brilliantly.

Olive's Ramble offers up something short and sweet and delightfully happy, whilst pieces like Big Bad Bill Is Sweet William Now, if I’m right, this was once a 1920’s jazz song, it seems familiar, but here Mad Dog and his harmonica bring it formally back into the realm of the blues.

Never in a million years did I ever expect to see one of my all-time favourite blues tracks being featured on the album St. James Infirmary, I actually have this by the British rock band Geordie, whose lead singer Brian Johnson would later to go on to front AC/DC, this song has indeed been influential to many artists, the symbiotic partnership here of the band, manifests one of the best versions I have heard in the modern era.

We end this tale of plenty with the offering Pachelbel in D Minor, it’s a neat example of cross-genre experimentation, turning a well-known classical piece into a minor-key, blues-tinged interpretation, also we come from Cyprus, and you could Greek folk dance to this piece with ease, what a clever way with which to leave the album.

Music Heals by Mad Dog Blues is with ease the best album of their career, kudos to each and every artist on this album, kudos to the engineering and production, again some of the best I have heard by them, if you are a fan of this genre, this is a must buy and probably one of the most entertaining releases in the world of blues and instrumental music for many a year you will have heard.