Backed by the Evil Gal Festival Orchestra, boisterous blues belter Michelle Willson summons up the spirit of Dinah Washington, Etta James, Big Mama Thornton and Big Maybelle on Wake Up Call (Bullseye 11661-9639-2; 47:33). Possessing an imposing set of pipes that could blow down all three of the little pigs’ houses, Wilson delivers the title track with a touch of sultry finesse, then turns around and wails with raucous abandon on Don Robey’s “Just Like a Dog” and Buddy Johnson’s “They Don’t Want Me to Rock No More.” She shows a great feel for swinging on shuffles on “Leap of Faith” and gets intimate on the noirish “Think About Me,” which has her in deep Dinah mode. There’s lots of exuberant, upbeat party fare here, like “Pleasin’ You,” the N’awlins flavored “Set You Free,” the R&B novelty number “Water Water” and the lighthearted “Mi My Moo.” Ken Clark provides a velvety, swinging B-3 cushion throughout while Scott Shetler kicks in some smoking tenor sax and Barry Fleischer adds some swagger on baritone sax. Good frat party music, circa 1962.
Originally PublishedRelated Posts
Sonny Terry/Brownie McGhee: Backwater Blues
Start Your Free Trial to Continue Reading

Jonathan Butler: The Simple Life
Jonathan Butler’s optimistic music belies a dirt-poor childhood growing up in a South Africa segregated by apartheid. Live in South Africa, a new CD and DVD package, presents a sense of the resulting inner turmoil, mixed with dogged resolve, that paved the way to his status as an icon in his country and successful musician outside of it. Looking back, the 46-year-old Butler says today, the driving forces that led to his overcoming apartheid-the formal policy of racial separation and economic discrimination finally dismantled in 1993-were family, faith and abundant talent.
“When we were kids, our parents never talked about the ANC [African National Congress] or Nelson Mandela,” he says. Butler was raised as the youngest child in a large family. They lived in a house patched together by corrugated tin and cardboard, in the “coloreds only” township of Athlone near Cape Town. “They never talked about struggles so we never knew what was happening.”
Start Your Free Trial to Continue Reading

Scott LaFaro
Previously unavailable recordings and a new bio illuminate the legend of bassist Scott LaFaro
Kurt Elling: Man in the Air
Nate Chinen makes the argument that Kurt Elling is the most influential jazz vocalist of our time