Bentley’s Bandstand: March 2025
By Bill Bentley
Allison August AUGUST MOON. There’s a blossoming of blue-eyed soul music sweeping around the corners of popular music now, and if you listen closely to singers like Allison August it’s possible to hear the same spirit of glory that roared over America in the 1960s. This woman reaches all the way down to find the ever erupting essence of a style that has marked the greatness of America for over a dozen decades, and AUGUST MOON feels like a new super step forward. Allison August’s voice can swing between subtlety, sweetness and sassiness, always taking the listener to a place they haven’t been before. Grammy Award winner producer and drummer Tony Braunagel is no stranger to this stylistic superlative, having been honed in Houston’s juke joints, and then in bands like Bonnie Raitt and the Phantom Blues Band. Together, with some of the best musicians in the blue-eyed bag alive today, they take on the highest level of achievement with all the gusto heard on the best bandstands. This is the type of sound that cannot be learned from a book; it has to come from a burn inside the heart that never lets go. Allison August is clearly one of those keepers. Her songwriting hits hard and stays there. Originals like “Dog in You,” “Blues is My Religion” and “I Ain’t Lyin’ sound like they could have been sweeping the streets of Memphis, Chicago and Houston a half-century ago, but arrive now with a sharp-edged feel that can’t be imitated from the past. They have to be lived now, and August is all in. And it never hurts to have a band with players like Bob Glaub, Paul Barerre (RIP), David J. Carpenter, Gregg Sutton (RIP), Mike Finnigan (RIP) and a handful of other heavyweights to make sure the studio sizzle is on high burn. Real soul music is a matter of essence, combination and, in the end, a feeling that finds the high ground and stays there. Lucky for listeners, it’s all right here. The songs, the singer, the studio players and, of course, supreme soul. Find and feel.
Jon Cleary THE BYWATER SESSIONS. Jon Cleary needs no introduction. He’s a piano-playing fool who immigrated from England to way down yonder in New Orleans to literally become a wonderful example of someone who is reborn in the life of what they were meant to live. Cleary took to the Crescent City like red beans and rice, and taught himself to be one of the great keyboard kings of that city or any other. He is absolutely the real deal and will not back down. THE BYWATER SESSIONS is a knocked-out collection of uptown and downtown only found in the City that Care Forgot. Listening to Cleary and his 7-man band is like a study in funkified Southern beauty. The rhythmic grooves are meant to turn the notch of experience up some pegs, and then revel in the strut and sassiness that the Big Easy has perfected. Cleary himself is one of the great piano players alive right now who knows just to find where the get-down shines in the glory, and he has always found a way to find the musicians who know how to get there with him. Any doubters are directed immediately to his “Zulu Coconuts,” which plays like a How To of directions to hit the monkey nerve this music hits square on every time it’s played. And when the crew hits “Fessa Longhair Boogalooa,” rapt listeners will feel like they’re walking down Decatur Street in the French Quarter straight to the Golden Lantern on Royal near Barracks to see what’s really going down. There hasn’t been an album quite this funky recorded in New Orleans this century. And who can tell when there will be again. But have no fear, because Jon Cleary is all the way here. And he radiates on the ’88s like few pianists can in 2025. So grab on tight, and be ready to shine the light. This is American music pureed from all kinds of backgrounds, and needs to be heard while you still can. Yeah you right.
Lance Cowan AGAINST THE GRAIN. One of the most amazing stories in music this past year starts right here. Singer-songwriter Lance Cowan has had a long and successful career as a music publicist centered in Nashville. He’s created one of the best PR agencies there or anywhere, really, and now with the release of his seriously mind-blowing album, it seems like some kind of hocus pocus has occurred. Right there in Music City. That’s because Cowan’s songs and vocals are some of the strongest of this decade. Right out of nowhere. Or so it seems. His voice is pure gold, the kind that comes along every decade if we’re lucky. The man’s phrasing and sensitivity to feel are beyond beatable. Really. The man is Eagles territory, out of the shadows. Yes, about half of the songs are written by co-writers, but that’s often the norm, especially in Nashville. One of his most impressive characteristics is the level of vocals by Lance Cowan. They are as wonderful as anything recorded in Nashville, and easily as original. There are no tricks anywhere. The lyrics hit the core of modern life and romantic dreams without employing a single trick. This is an artist for the long run, and someone who has not overdone anything. These are songs that are straight-up great. One like “Ragged Edge of Nothing” shows a depth of someone who thinks of originality. Might be time soon for a national tour to show the country the flip side from publicity of who Lance Cowan is. Stop the press.
Joe Ely LOVE + FREEDOM. A Joe Ely show often feels like a hot-blooded dice game that shows no sign of ever stopping. It’s like those precious moments when life gets turned up to 10 and no one in their right mind would want to ever go home. Ely’s songs have always held a good amount of gunpowder packed into them, and once the band kicks in there is no way all within hearing-distance aren’t going to the top of the world. There is something in the Texan’s music and his ability to deliver it all at the highest emotional elevation that contains elements of magic. Watching the man sing, play guitar, lead the band and pull down the almost-unattainable from the sky never fails to make life feel like it is going to go on forever, and what is happening all around the audience will hopefully always stay in their hearts. It’s like the magic button has been pushed and life takes on the X-factor with Ely’s voice taking us all on our journey. It is beyond uncanny and one of the gifts of our times, right next to the overflowing wonder of eternity now a part of our gifts. The man writes songs that can pull the stars down from the sky, and his way of adding his own third dimension to the contributions by Townes Van Zandt and other songwriters feels like a blessing only a few in life are given. For now, LOVE + FREEDOM is a widescreen vision of the entirety of what Joe Ely has always been capable of. In the end, there is no one else who can take listeners to this place like he does, and then bring them back home to offer a more vibrating place. There is magic in this music, and there always has been, whether he was playing in the back of a flat-bed pick-up truck with the Flatlanders or at a 4th of July Willie Nelson picnic in front of 100,000 listeners with the most exciting outfit in Texas. He is telling us what life can be, and giving us hope that all are able to grab hold and go to the promised land with him. “E” for Everything.
Thee Holy Brothers HIGH IN MY BALLOON. Could this possibly be? It’s almost like Brian Wilson snuck into the studio, fired up the machines and did some work on some of the tracks not locked up. Really. The harmonies, basic tracks, songwriting and lots of other odds and ends are that momentous. Thee Holy Brothers, aka Willie Aron and Marvin Etzion are a well-loved pair of unfenced musicians who have plied the trade for decades there, and have never met a rigid rule they liked. Etzioni, who wrote this suite of songs and does everything he tries, envisioned the project as a Trilogy, and sees these songs as Act II and are full-speed ahead on the finale. Studying their wide-view lens on music, there is no telling where it’s all going. But that’s the beauty of it all. These balloons are swerving around in the sky without a worry, and are as wide-open about a destination as the blue skies themselves. What’s obvious quickly is that Aron and Etzioni are fearless when it comes to composing and performing, which isn’t usually the case in 2025. There’s enough unhinged freedom in these songs and instrumentation that it’s tempting to say this pair of players are proud graduates of Cuckoo’s Nest University, and that’s a grand achievement. The HIGH IN MY BALLOON allbum cover features an old manual typewriter, a wooden chair and a snare drum. With these three items the sky is the limit–for balloons–and anything can be done. Key of dreams.
Lone Justice – VIVA. Once upon a time in Los Angeles, there was a young singer named Maria McKee and she wandered into a sort of musical miracle. There was a semi-dump of a club in the basement of a Hollywood Chinese restaurant named Cathay de Grande. A lot of way-cool bands started playing there, one named Top Jimmy & the Rhythm Pigs. They were a full-tilt rhythm & blues crew, with singer Top Jimmy a man open to anything. Some nights Tom Waits wandered in and got onstage, and a few times Bryan McLean from the classic L.A. group Love sat in. McLean’s younger teenaged-sister Maria McKee also had an unmatchable voice and she found her way there. Her signature piece back then with the Rhythm Pigs was Aretha Franklin’s “Chain of Fools,” which always brought the small but devoted audience down. Soon enough, McKee showed her country voice and people fell out. The path was set. McKee, along with some country-minded players figured out the future was with what had got labeled Cow Punk, and Lone Justice was born. McKee was a singer that comes along very rarely in a lifetime, especially right in the middle of Hollywood. She was almost too good to be true, and it wasn’t long before the group were signed to Geffen Records and got super-producer Jimmy Iovine (John Lennon, Tom Petty, Bruce Springsteen, etc.), from the top of the lot. Bingo. But not everything went quite as hoped, including Lone Justice’s spot on the U2 tour as openers in sports stadiums, showing the Los Angelenos still-developing strengths a little too well. But luckily there were tapes that were not released from the band’s first half-decade, which was about as long as they lasted. Now, 30 years later those tapes have indeed been worked on and are now seeing the light of day. And what recordings they are. Early members Maria McKee, Ryan Hedegecock, Marvin Etzioni and the late Don Heffington are all here, along with several impressive additions and sonic twinges. It’s like a tale on what might have been, but then again time can’t be rolled back, but what was is what was. What can be done is to hear the greatness of a young American aggregation in a time when invention was the bulls-eye shot that in music is very often the strength of beginners. And here all can hear an incredibly wondrous singer in Maria McKee, a near-great band growing into an endlessly exciting group that just maybe was meant to stay once upon a time. Justice still rules.
Janiva Magness BACK FOR ME. When it comes to modern soul music, Janiva Magness has been a go-to singer for decades. She got her stripes young and has never lost them. The power she wields when she wades into a song is an unforgettable affair. Whether she’s kicking ass and taking names or molding a ballad into her very own invention, it’s always the same. The woman sings as if her life depends on it, and it just may. This is a woman who has seen the upside and downside of life, and always picks the brighter choice, even if she has to struggle for it. On BACK FOR ME, Magness digs in deep and comes out with a lifetime achievement. Really. She has a handful of national musician names here, but the really impressive side of the set is just how incredible all the players are, and how producer Davie Darling blends it all together. But it’s the voice of Ms. Magness that rings the big bell. This is some serious stuff that has been gathered, and really feels like an apex for the vocalist. Really. It’s all there: the kind of feeling on songs that paint a picture of a lifetime. Naturally, the song selection is beyond belief, from Bill Withers to Doyle Bramhall II and back. There’s not a crack in the stack. And any album featuring a soul-melting version of Tracy Nelson’s “Down So Low” shows its seriousness from the git. In truth, there aren’t many singers in the world that should take this classic on. It’s truly demanding, but this is a woman who can handle it. For something to shake the bones and that song is the one. Janiva Soul Convention.
Oscar Peterson HELLO HERBIE. Without any doubt, Oscar Peterson is in the group of history’s greatest jazz pianists. In some ways, he didn’t have quite the gravitas of, say, Thelonious Monk or Bud Powell. But that didn’t mean he didn’t possess every bit the abilities of those two all-stars. Peterson lasted many years, and never left the lane he perfected. His recording career was equal to anyone’s and to this day he remains in the Hall of Fame of most jazz lovers. HELLO HERBIE is an exquisite live set recorded in late 1969 by Hans Geong Brunner-Schwer in his private studio in Villingen, Germany. The trio added non-pareil jazz guitarist Herb Ellis for this date, to put the whole affair through the roof, making it a must-own by all Oscar Peterson true-blue fans. The sublime feel of every song is something that very few jazz aggregations ever reached. The feeling generated is like life has suspended, and selections like “Exactly Like You,” “A Lovely Way to Spend an Evening” and “Seven Come Eleven” fill in the ection with perfectly matched songs to musicians take listeners on a perfect ride. From ballads to up-tempo selections, the seven songs sound like players from another era, which they are, but also did right into modernity without losing an emotion. Joining Peterson and Ellis, bassist Sam Jones and drummer Bob Durham make the quartet exactly what these jazz titans need in spurring each other on, and also how they interpret the material so nothing is missing. When it comes to Herb Ellis live recordings, this is at the very top of his catalogue, as his guitar comes totally alive and is taken to the limit.
Lynn Taylor and the Barflies WHERE THE HEART IS. Lynn Taylor is the sort of singer that is practicing high-level juju with a six-piece and a mojo generator turned onto high tilt somewhere on the bandstand. At first, the outfit might seem easily accessible, but by about a minute into each song something happens that the very air in the room feels like it is infused with magic. It’s not really the sort of thing that comes around every year. Instead it’s magic. It really is. Taylor’s voice doesn’t have an easily identifiable history. Instead, the man sings like he’s been living in air itself, flying about the earth collecting influences and learning just how this crazy planet rotates. And fortunately, Taylor is able to reach into different environments at will and scoop up a bucket of feelings and put them together so they don’t sound like anyone else. This man is truly on his own quest, and isn’t trying to do anything that’s been done before. Sure, there are plenty of song ingredients that might bring to mind others, but not in any way to be pointed out with any sure hand. Maybe that’s because Lynn Taylor really seems a few inches off, which in a musical sense is a mighty fine way to live if you get there and return back to earth when it’s time to check in. That same uniqueness is true of Taylor’s superfine songs. Take examples like “Carnival In Hell,” “The Twilight Years of Florence and Ebenezer,” “648 Miles Between You and Me”” and every one of the 11 songs on the disc. When it’s time to go off-road and do a little bit of exploring, follow this man and his Barflies. They’ll get where it needs going, and as one of their songs is named: “Time to Change.”
Benmont Tench THE MELANCHOLY SEASON. Benmont Tench has been one of the most sought after keyboard players in rock & roll sessions for almost half a century. Known far and wide as a member of Tom Petty’s solid-ground group The Heartbreakers since their beginning, Tench is also someone valued not just for his playing but his soul. Really. He has an unerring way to zero in on what is happening, and very often what needs to happen. And, as the song says, he doesn’t back down. There is a way Tench understands the forces at work, and helps steer them to where that work can be exactly what is needed. So it is with great anticipation that the man’s new solo album finally arrives after too many years. and what an album it is. There is a grandness about it which comes across with total truth. In fact, there is a feeling of bedrock honesty that runs through the songs which is seldom heard in modern music. It sounds new and well-seasoned all at once. And there isn’t anything else these days that wanders into Benmont Tench’s air space at all. He’s got that totally to himself. With producer Jonathan Wilson, the pair know exactly how to use it. Naturally, THE MELANCHOLY SEASON is on George Harrison’s Dark Horse Records label. Where it belongs.
Book of the Month
Dennis McNally: THE LAST GREAT DREAM
It makes total sense that lauded writer Dennis McNally be the one to really put the long range view on the counterculture and bring it into a near-perfect focus. After all, the man was the official publicist for the Grateful Dead, among many other up-close endeavors during the last half-century. McNally saw what really happened, and was right next to him during so much of it. When San Francisco first started to blossom its flower power, it was obviously a time for change whether anyone focused on it or not. It was freedom for all, good or not, and there were a certain few who had the real bird’s-eye view to see its evolution. One would be this man. The way McNally really senses the important parts of the evolution haven’t ever really been expressed like this. Leave it to a true blue historian to burrow into the big and small parts of those times, and frame them in a way which hasn’t been done. All the major suspects and events are accounted for, and reported on in a way which brings new meaning to the ins, the outs and and the circular nature of so much of this. And the way the history plays out through such solid reporting and, even better, new understanding, is somewhat historic in itself. So much of the straight-up story of, to quote the book cover, “How Bohemians Became Hippies and Created the Sixties.” gets lost in the fog of other history tomes. Not Dennis McNally’s. The smoke might have been thick, but Dennis McNally was quicker and captured the truth. Wow! Tune in now.
Bentley’s Bandstand: March 2025
