Steve Howell, Dan Sumner & Jason Weinheimer – I Don’t Mind
You have to admire how a trio can recapture a vintage sound, mood & atmosphere using modern equipment & not being 100 years old for themselves. This showcase was recorded in a wonderfully relaxed, laid-back finger-picking guitar feel soaked in a ‘50s groove. Cocktails, not beer, cigars, not cigarettes, fedoras not baseball caps & wingtips not sneakers. I think the word is class. It’s music that could be relegated to easy listening, middle-of-the-road or lounge music but since the lyrics are more vivid in a bluesy jazz attitude, it takes on a whole different feel in the ear.
East Texas musician Steve Howell (vocals/guitar), Louisiana’s Dan Sumner (guitar) & Arkansas’ Jason Weinheimer (bass) perform with an I Don’t Mind (Dropped Oct 13/Out of the Past Music/47:53) character which starts with the jump-blues of “Choo Choo Ch’Boogie,” & the whimsical “The Fresno Shuffle,” produced by Jason & recorded in Arkansas & Louisiana.
It’s an unadorned performance. You can hear their patience holding tight in the tradition of the idiom. The voice is not raspy, or raw but loaded with the grit of experience. The interweaving of guitar notes on the title track “I Don’t Mind” (1944) is mellifluous & opulent. There are 12 vintage numbers covered in this set. The 6-panel CD outlines individually, who the composers are, who had hits with the songs, & it’s a surprising outlay from artists like Louis Jordan, Dave Van Ronk, Duke Ellington, Cole Porter, W.C. Handy, Connee Boswell with the Dorsey Brothers, Thelonius Monk, Tommy Dorsey & Bing Crosby.
Sung with a bluesy folky style of 1920’s chanteuse Lee Morse, Steve Howell sings “St. Louis Blues” with that kind of slow simmer ballad intonation that made the melody a classic. It was a 1914 W.C. Handy song that was good enough to morph into a pop song. In the ‘20s Bessie Smith waxed it, & it was recorded by Louis Armstrong & several other name artists.
Steve isn’t Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett or Bessie Smith but his voice is appropriately applied to these lyrics & the guitar playing is an impressive undertaking & reinterpretation that paints these FM radio tunes after midnight to take a listener easily through its late hours just before Madrugada.
The stylizations have only value as entertainment, but it’s in the sincerity that’s applied that raises each rendition to a respectable level. This album is a single resource, a great deep well of the finest early 20th Century songbook.
Highlights – “Choo Choo Ch’Boogie,” “The Fresno Shuffle,” “I Don’t Mind,” “Love For Sale,” “St. Louis Blues” & “Don’t Get Around Much Anymore.”
Color image courtesy of the trio’s Facebook. CD @ iTunes & Amazon + https://www.facebook.com/steve.howell1/posts/hey-just-wanted-to-let-everybody-know-that-my-boys-dan-sumner-and-jason-weinheim/10239783314908119/