JP Soars & Anne Harris – Gypsy Blue Revue
Cross Howlin’ Wolf with some Watermelon Slim & you’ll conjure JP Soars & Anne Harris (fiddle/mandolin), whose fiddle adds a whole new dimension to this blues ensemble with Soars varied & impeccable guitar work. It’s a refreshing blues sketch that retains its aged melodic confines & codifies it with a sweet dark arrangement. Well, it’s like Cherries Jubilee or Baked Alaska – a dark meringue, ice cream with a touch of cognac lit up in a blue flame – flambeed. Yeah baby. That’s this music. Sweet with fire.
“Jessie Mae” is flambeed, but it’s coupled with the fiery instrumental “Go With the Flow,” & there’s a touch here of Swing-era musicality through Anne’s fiddle as “Sing Sing Sing” drifts through. Chris Peet’s drums are Gene Krupa- delicious, pure & delectable. Peet returns with a grand short drum solo on “Minor Blues,” then decorates with power & inventiveness on the skins with “Cigar Box Jam.”
The guitar & fiddle applications on the 9 tunes recorded in Ft Lauderdale, FL. & Cadiz, Ohio by producer JP (vocals/electric & acoustic guitars/2-string cigar box/lap steel/Merlin stick dulcimer/ cavaquinho/dobro/cowbell/shekere/whistle) is quite a feat on Gypsy Blue Revue (Drops May 29/Forty Below/55:19). Whether sung or instrumental, the band maintains their absorbing music culled from blues, gypsy jazz, Swing-era grooves, Latin touches, a dab of country & yes, R&R as a preservative.
The LP has clarity that never interferes with the gutsy creative embellishments the performers are purveyors of. They dwell in the hothouse of Americana/roots with all the elements of the other hybrids & they’re able to pull a vision from it. The LP concludes with the extraordinary 18-minute “Cigar Box Jam,” a well-delivered & varied guitar “sound” as exciting as the 1966 Paul Butterfield Blues Band’s “East-West.” This effort is equally captivating, intense, & interesting. I’m impressed. Ms. Harris, who’s exciting on stage, fires away enthusiastically on her fiddle with Jerry Goodman/Mahavishnu Orchestra smoke. The band is tight; they’re into it. There are Santana & Beatles music snippets & bassist Cleveland Frederick explodes with stirring bongos – fabulously. The JP Soars guitars would make any band soar.
Both “Goin’ To South Carolina” & the Appalachian-flavored “Old Silver Bridge” are marvelous. The music’s haunting & conjures so much so, even a city boy on the 5th floor of a tenement could lie out on the fire escape & the music will take him to an oak tree beside a running stream – all he has to do is close his eyes & listen. Young girls will want to dance & even their metropolitan-area dresses, tight jeans & sneakers won’t resist this pied piper. Well done? No. Impeccably done. One of the year’s best. I wouldn’t lie.
Highlights – “Jessie Mae,” “Go With the Flow,” “Goin’ To South Carolina,” “May Mountain Waltz,” “Minor Blues” & “Cigar Box Jam.”
Musicians – Jeremy Staska (shaker/tambourine).
Images courtesy of their JP’s website. CD @ https://jpsoars.com/gypsy-blue-revue/ & https://fortybelowrecords.com/store-bu6al/p/gypsybluerevue & https://jpsoars.com/
Enjoy our previous coverage here: REVIEW: J.P. Soars “Brick By Brick”