Omnivore Recordings has been one of the steadiest labels in the reissue and archival biz for a while now, as the releases covered in today’s column by Little Richard, Van Duren, and NRBQ should illuminate. But Omnivore also dishes the occasional contemporary album, which is the case with the latest from Joey Molland, formerly of Badfinger. Little Richard’s Southern Child arrives on vinyl for Record Store Day’s Black Friday. The CD follows on December 4. Most of these offerings are available on vinyl, and everything is on compact disc and digital. Considerations begin directly below.
Little Richard’s passing has been one of the lowlights of 2020. But one of the salves to this burn of bad news has been Omnivore’s reissue of Richard’s early ’70s albums for Reprise, which help to illuminate a comeback that produced a few minor hit singles and an appealing if uneven vitality beginning with The Rill Thing in 1970 and continuing with The King of Rock and Roll the following year (both were covered in our New in Stores column the week of September 17).
The Second Coming, his third (and last) record to be released by Reprise, hitting stores in 1972, didn’t yield any chart entries, but it’s the strongest of the bunch, partly because of sheer consistency spurred by a killer band that includes saxophonist Lee Allen and drummer Earl Palmer; even the pedal steel of Sneaky Pete Kleinow gets into the mix.
Another reason for the evenness of flow comes down to Bumps Blackwell’s return as producer, coupled with an emphasis on original material, although “The Saints” is a rewrite of a certain New Orleans cornerstone that hits like a mixture of Richard, The Coasters, and Isaac Hayes-style funk guitar. Not only does The Second Coming roll along with hardly a quality hiccup, the non-LP bonus tracks “Money Is” and “Do It to It,” both cut under the supervision of Quincy Jones for the film $ (Starring Warren Beatty and Goldie Hawn) avoid the aura of letdown that’s often associated with extras. CD and digital only. A-
Southern Child was recorded for Reprise by Richard at the same time as The Second Coming, also with Blackwell on board, and was set to be his third for the label. However, it was ultimately shelved and left unheard until 2006, when the contents were included on Rhino Handmade’s 3CD retrospective of the Reprise era. That one’s now out-of-print.
After prepping Southern Child for release, second thoughts crept up, likely because the record is a detour into country-rock, though perhaps the better description is country-funk, as Richard doesn’t abandon the grit and groove of R&B. The finale of the prospective LP, “The Puppy Dog Song,” is an outright funky throbber reportedly from the sessions for The Second Coming, but the rest is much nearer to country stylistically, with “Ain’t No Tellin’” the apex in this regard, loaded with pedal steel and glistening mandolin, and a touch of eccentricity that might’ve contributed to its shelving. A-
After The Second Coming failed to make much of a commercial dent, Little Richard was done with Reprise, cutting a single for the Greene Mountain label and a LP for Kent before exiting the R&R scene once again to work as a traveling bible salesman. He didn’t return to secular music until 1986, cutting Lifetime Friend for Warner Brothers, which turned out to be his last full-length.
Sadly, it pales in comparison to his Reprise material, largely because it tries so hard to sound up to the date of its recording, though the initial impression, provided by opening cooker “Great Gosh A’mighty,” which features a ripping guitar solo from Travis Wammack (who’d been a part of The Rill Thing back in 1970), was that Lifetime Friend might just beat the ’80s comeback odds. Richard is in strong voice throughout, but only one other track, “One Ray of Sunshine,” transcends the trappings. By no means an embarrassment, the set is just very difficult to get excited about. CD and digital only. C
Van Duren, who started out in Memphis as a contemporary of Big Star and moved to NYC for a stretch to cut his debut Are You Serious? in Connecticut with Jon Tiven, is indisputably a cult figure, but one with enough standing to encourage the making of a documentary film Waiting: The Van Duren Story, with an accompanying soundtrack released by Omnivore reviewed here at TVD early in 2019. Now the label’s following up with full reissues of the debut and second LP Idiot Optimism, with both getting the vinyl treatment.
Are You Serious? surely reinforces Van Duren’s associations with Big Star principals Chris Bell and Jody Stephens (he played with both in The Baker Street Regulars), but don’t go thinking the record’s an unearthed hunk of pure power pop. Surely elements of the style are in the stew, but just as prominent are similarities to pre-Utopia Todd Rundgren. To his credit, Van Duren’s not a copyist, and there is a late ’70s thrust to the writing (all originals, with one co-write with Stephens) and swagger to the singing and playing that marks the album as a byproduct of its time. In this case, datedness isn’t a fault. B+
The same is true of Van Duren’s second album Idiot Optimism, long unreleased until a Japanese label dropped it onto on CD in 1999 but with no input from the artist; this edition provides Duren full creative control and debuts the music on vinyl (a double set) and digital. When reviewing Waiting, I was perhaps a little blasé, but after recently spending time with the power pop volumes in Rhino’s DIY compilation series, I must say that Idiot Optimism goes down pretty easy, if not perfectly, and only strengthens the case for Duren as a songwriter; it’s all originals save for Bell’s “Make a Scene.” B+
NRBQ stand, in my estimation, as one of the cornerstones of cult music fandom. Part of the reason comes down to a stylistic inclusiveness (I like to think of it as Americana before Americana, something they share with The Blasters) that gets expressed in a fully-formed, occasionally off-kilter but highly accessible sound; one could also call NRBQ the most discerning party rock act on the planet.
As a rarities collection, In • Frequencies might not seem like the best vehicle to express the ultimate togetherness of the band’s approach, especially as it spans from a 1968 soundcheck tape of “Dogwood Winter” to a 2018 studio recording of “April Showers” cut with Hal Willner (RIP), but the contents, which do begin in ’68 but are rendered non-chronologically, trounce this speculation with authority. It all goes down with gusto, even. It’s still tempting to caution that this set isn’t the place for newbies to begin with the Q, but honestly, anybody curious who discovers a copy of In • Frequencies in the racks on vinyl or CD shouldn’t hesitate to utilize it as a personal jumping-in place. It’s the pricier limited color wax that’s a reward for the more experienced fans. A-
Joey Molland was one of the three songwriters in Badfinger, a highly underrated outfit, to say nothing of tragic; after the suicide of Pete Ham in 1975, Molland left the group, returned, and then departed once more to begin a solo career. I’ll confess to not keeping track of his subsequent activity, of which Be True to Yourself is the first collection of new recordings in nearly a decade.
Entering the studio with producer Mark Hudson, who also helped write the album, and with some guest contributions from Molland’s friends Julian Lennon, Micky Dolenz, and Steve Holley (a member of Mott the Hoople and Paul McCartney’s Wings), Be True to Yourself is a surprisingly consistent pop-rock album, with the boldness of execution reinforced by a similarity to Jeff Lynne/ ELO (hitting an apex with the combo punch of “Heaven” and “All I Want to Do”) as much as Badfinger. This should effectively communicate Molland’s disinterest in regurgitating prior achievements.
I mentioned consistency, but really, the record, against the odds, only gets better as it nears conclusion. The penultimate cut, the McCartney-esque “Shine,” is a doozy, and the title-track finale is a baroque psych-pop fiesta. In fact, the main disappointment relates to format, as Be True to Yourself is currently CD and digital only. A-
