Two Joels big on sound
Fafard and Schwartz Borrowed Horses www.joelfafard.com/ schwartz ★★★★ out of 5
With some borrowed tunes and a few of their own, Fafard and Schwartz (both Joels) prove the pleasures and possible profit of two guys sitting in a room jamming on some tunes.
Fafard plays slide on a resonator guitar, thumps his foot, and sings in a weathered, even-worn voice, while Schwartz handles mostly the electric guitar, creating a strong tension in the snap of those bottom strings.
They do Mississippi John Hurt’s Pay Day and another song about living rough and working tough, the railroad building Walking Boss.
They do some sprightly country picking on A.P. Carter’s Solid Gone and more of that skip-along beat in Trouble in Mind. There’s also the quiet desperation of the traditional John Hardy and some more desperate, raspy-voiced moments in Bruce Springsteen’s State Trooper.
For originals, the fellows do instrumentals, the spooky Disappearance of Mme. Toulouse, the lovely melody of Blue Mountain Hymn, and the quiet and easy going St. Cecilia. Pleasure proved from beginning to end.
Monkey Junk All Frequencies Stony Plain ★★★ out of 5
The title is All Frequencies — old transistor radios pictured inside attest to the retro feel of the music these three guys make.
Monkey Junk goes for a guitar/ bass/ drums bedrock with lots of harmonica and lead guitar soloing and some organ thrown in here and there.
They hammer things hard with opener You Make a Mess, complete with wah wah guitar solo — now there’s blast from the past — then harp howls for the R & B grind of Right from Wrong. These are hard luck songs about hard luck people. Indeed, the R & B of Why Are People Like That? reacts to all these bad folk.
The upbeat funk of Je Nah Say Kwah sings of an exotic woman, while Yearnin’ for Yesterday is a mid-tempo melodic rocker about a girl from the past.
The songs are all good enough tunes, but they go on longer than they need to, with the exception of closer Swank. It’s a seven-minute instrumental romp. It begins like a 1960s dance party in hip-hugger jeans, bopping on electric piano, then someone spikes the punch and it slows to a psychedelic trip. Oops. Time to call the parents.