As part of my on-going effort to listen to music from MY music library, last week, I randomly selected five albums and loaded them into my CD player. Then at some point in the week I listened to them. I confess that I did listen to one of them twice? Any quesses on which one? Anyway here are the five albums…..
Little Lion – Brooks Williams
This is one of my favorite acoustic guitar albums. The album was released in 2000. It was his second release coming on the heels of Brook’s debut album Hundred Year Shadow.
My wife and I saw him at The Main Point in Bryan Mawr around the time of the release of his debut album, which had been getting a lot of air time on Philly’s WXPN. When I spoke with him during the break in the show, I told him O was in awe of his guitar work. He said that was his first love. He also said he was working on an acoustic guitar album!
New Riders of the Purple Sage – New Riders of the Purple Sage (NPRS)
While this is the CD version NRPS’s debut album, I do own the album on vinyl. NPRS along with Poco laid the groundwork for my life long love of country rock.
If you guessed, at the beginning of this post, this was the album I listened to twice, you were correct!
My wife and I always say “we were hippies without the drugs” and I lived vicariously through the music of bands like NPRS and Jefferson Airplane. “Henry” is one of my an all-time favorite songs.
Step Right Up – Charlie Robison
Amazon Website
Charlie Robison, his brother Bruce, pat Green and Jack Ingram and other Texas Music artists were are staples in my music rotation in the late 1990s and early 2000s.
During those years Charlie’s wife was a member of the Dixie Chicks. “ The Wedding Song” which features Emily’s band mate Natalie Maines is probably the best known track on the album. (Natalie’s father Lloyd Maines was, at the time, a bandmate of one of my musical heroes Jerry Jeff Walker and a fantastic one of musics best steel guitar players)
As I listened to this album for the first time in a long time, I realized that Charlie was a damn good songwriter and storyteller. And his prowess is on display in songs on this album in songs like “John O’Reily”, “Desperate Times” and even “one in a Million” which he wrote with his brother Bruce”
Charlie released his last album High Life. 2013. He has now officially retired! I wish him well and after listening to Step Right Up I think I need to go back and visit some of Charlie’/ other albums in my CD shelves.
Omar’s Blues – David Olney
David Olney was one of the myriad of artists who left us in 2020. He died in January of 2020 prior to the start of the pandemic. He was giving his third performance of the day at a folk festival in Florida when he became still dropped his head. It took several minutes before anyone realized he had passed.
David was a world class storyteller and songwriter. Note I say storyteller first because that to me was where he stood head and shoulders above most songwriters.
The late Townes Van Zandt famously said of Olney: “Any time anyone asks me who my favorite music writers are… I say Mozart, Lightnin Hopkins, Bob Dylan and Dave Olney. Dave Olney is one of the best songwriters I’ve ever heard — and that’s true. I mean that from my heart.”
About Omar’s Blues
Charlie Hunter writes the following about Omar’s Blues on the David Olney page at mysongwiters.com
Olney is unafraid to salt his narratives with historical figures, with lines overheard and lives assumed. In OMAR’S BLUES, Olney introduces us to a fantastical orbit of outcasts, misfits and shadowy characters whose lives may not be all they dreamed of, but who take a seedy comfort in what they do have. Some of the characters are literally historical, some biblical, some archtypal–the existential wanderer of “Lazlo” who comes to life only during the course of the song or in dreams, Inspector LeGarde and criminal Jean Paul Levesque whose grudging acquaintanceship and mutual suspicion form an uneasy pas de deux. “Those two are sort of like characters from ‘Casablanca’ who just wandered into my mind one day,” laughs Olney. “They wouldn’t leave until I wrote a song about them.”
Inspector LeGarde and Jean Paul Levesque appear in my favorite song “The Paris Incident” on Omar’s Blues.
Final Thoughts
Most of the David Olney albums that are in my music library were released between 1995 and 2005. was released on the Dead Reckoning label in 2000.
After listening to David Olney last week Ana again today I also listened to his 2018 release This Side or the Other and loved it! I definitely want to listen to the album again and hopefully after which I’ll tell you about it!
Voices from Heaven – Vol.2 – Runaround Malonen and Trom Syverson
Now I will confess I didn’t listen to all of the fifth album Voices from Heaven. However you can read a post I wrote about the album back in 2017 here
On the sidebar is a playlist from Spotify containing songs from three of the above albums. Omar’s Blues is not on Spotify. So here is an official video from David Olney’s This Side or the Other
