Music for Grownups Reviews: Henry Butler and Steve Winwood
Henry Butler's 'PiaNOLA Live' and Steve Winwood's 'Nine Lives'
By: Richard Gehr | Source: AARP.org | April 2008
Richard Gehr is a veteran music critic based in New York City.
Henry Butler
"PiaNOLA Live"
Basin Street
The album title's capital letters are shorthand for “New Orleans, La.” And you can hear just how much the city has influenced American popular music in the big, funky bass lines and jazzed-up melodies on this album, which cherry-picks two decades of live performances by this great pianist (and less-great singer).
Henry Butler plays powerful piano in the local style pioneered by the legendary Professor Longhair, whose "Tipitina" is here transformed into an almost symphonic history of Crescent City sounds. Blind since his birth in 1949, Butler has a knack for opening up ballads, such as Otis Redding's “(Sittin' On) the Dock of the Bay" and the former Lousiana governor, Jimmie Davis's, "You Are My Sunshine" into cinema-scopic experiences.
Steve Winwood
"Nine Lives"
Columbia
Hot on the heels of his recent tour with former Blind Faith bandmate, Eric Clapton, Steve Winwood returns to the dusky, minor-key, jazz-rock grooves of his prior band, Traffic, for this masterful solo effort.
Fans of Traffic's 1970 hit album, "John Barleycorn Must Die," will be particularly impressed with laid-back, long-form vamps, such as "Hungry Man," "Dirty City," and "Secrets." Winwood seems to be painting a portrait of dark times in simmering R&B tones anchored by his blue-eyed, soulful voice and Hammond B3 organ. The bluesy "I'm Not Drowning" and "Other Shore," meanwhile, bracket the album with the possibilities of redemption either today or tomorrow.
"PiaNOLA Live"
Basin Street
The album title's capital letters are shorthand for “New Orleans, La.” And you can hear just how much the city has influenced American popular music in the big, funky bass lines and jazzed-up melodies on this album, which cherry-picks two decades of live performances by this great pianist (and less-great singer).
Henry Butler plays powerful piano in the local style pioneered by the legendary Professor Longhair, whose "Tipitina" is here transformed into an almost symphonic history of Crescent City sounds. Blind since his birth in 1949, Butler has a knack for opening up ballads, such as Otis Redding's “(Sittin' On) the Dock of the Bay" and the former Lousiana governor, Jimmie Davis's, "You Are My Sunshine" into cinema-scopic experiences.
Steve Winwood
"Nine Lives"
Columbia
Hot on the heels of his recent tour with former Blind Faith bandmate, Eric Clapton, Steve Winwood returns to the dusky, minor-key, jazz-rock grooves of his prior band, Traffic, for this masterful solo effort.
Fans of Traffic's 1970 hit album, "John Barleycorn Must Die," will be particularly impressed with laid-back, long-form vamps, such as "Hungry Man," "Dirty City," and "Secrets." Winwood seems to be painting a portrait of dark times in simmering R&B tones anchored by his blue-eyed, soulful voice and Hammond B3 organ. The bluesy "I'm Not Drowning" and "Other Shore," meanwhile, bracket the album with the possibilities of redemption either today or tomorrow.
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