Steve Cropper & The Midnight Hour - Friendlytown

Houston, I have a problem.  I don’t go a bundle on the vocals supplied by Roger C. Reale on Friendlytown.  No harm to the guy, this is purely a matter of personal taste.  His singing is tuneful enough and his phrasing is okay, but he generally sounds like he’s singing from the back of his throat in a way that I find distracting.
This is a bit of a pain when you’re listening to a Steve Cropper album, which is really all about the songs and the grooves, rather than some guitar fireworks festival. Though it should be said that Cropper and co-producer/bassist Jon Tiven have roped in Billy F Gibbons as a “band member”, contributing both guitar parts and a bunch of songwriting credits to Friendlytown – hence the “Midnight Hour” moniker.

Steve Cropper and common-or-garden guitar

Pic by Stacie Huckeba

Title track 'Friendlytown' gets the show on the road, and chugs along very nicely, with a simple, stinging riff, augmented by organ and rambling bass, and counterpointed by a flickering guitar line.  It’s a good relaxed tune too.  But like I say, I'm not sold on Reale’s vocal delivery.  And on the following ‘Too Much Stress’ that problem is compounded by allowing Brian May to get behind the mic for a duet.  It’s a lightweight tune with country-rock’n’roll foundations, and May’s thin voice doesn’t give it any more heft.  He’s more at home injecting some fizz via a guitar exchange, and there’s a key change to add an extra twist, but it remains short on personality.  Queen’s ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’ wasn’t a million miles away from this in style, but was turned into something memorable by Freddie Mercury camping it up big time.
Still, things buck up a bit on the following ‘Hurry Up Sundown’, a likeable song that packs a fair amount into three minutes.  A shave-and-a-haircut rhythm is accompanied by handclaps, trilling piano, and burbling horns, as the undercurrent for neat tumbling riff that’s the launchpad for a tasty pinging guitar break.  The following ‘Let’s Get Started’ is a cantering excursion in a Northern Soul direction, with attractive twiddling guitars over the four-on-the-floor beat, and if there’s not much to it melodically speaking it does have a suitable positive vibe.
‘Liars, Crooks & Clowns’ is a lurching chug reminiscent of Springsteen’s ‘Seeds’ in tone, though without the gutsiness.  It does have a more interesting lyric than some of the stuff here though, and it has to be said that Reale’s vocal sounds better too, by virtue of being in a slightly higher register.  The same is true of ‘In God We Trust’, and there’s also a buzz’n’twang combination to the guitars that works well, along with the popping guitar licks on the fade-out.  But if the simple melody is decent enough, the lyrics veer towards the dull.
The upbeat ‘Reality Check’ is better, basically reworking the riff from ‘Take Me To The River’ with a sense of urgency rather than tension, while Reale’s emphatic vocal does justice to the sentiment that “Everybody’s breathing down my neck, I can’t even cash my reality check”.
Along the way there’s also the slow blues of ‘I’ll Take Tomorrow’, on which a sparse arrangement includes wafts of organ and some low end warping and wefting lead guitar that's down to Cropper rather than Gibbons.  There’s also a Seventies Stonesy kinda feel to ‘Lay It On Down’, with buzzing rhythm guitar and spiky lead mingling over clipping drums and parping horns, the satisfying tune also enlivened by a warped twanger of a guitar break.
‘Rain On My Parade’ is an appealing smoother soul offering, with a dreamy feel and languid guitar chords, boosted by some chocolatey bass from Tiven and staccato horn punctuation, and some perky lead guitar work.  And ‘There’s Always A Catch’ is something of a back to basics affair that might have been better if they’d really committed to the quasi-Latin vibe of the intro, though it does get better in the middle when backing vocals and horns stiffen it and give it more oomph.
Thirteen tracks is too many for my liking, but Friendlytown is an entertaining enough album in spite of its various flaws – Cropper still has the grooves, and Billy Gibbons brings an additional spark on the lead guitar front.  File under friendly fun.

 
Friendlytown is out now on Provogue Records, and can be ordered here.

Steve Cropper - Fire It Up

“I remember yesterday like it’s right in front of me,” goes a line in the track ‘Two Wrongs’.  Which sums up Steve Cropper’s new solo album Fire It Up rather well, as its effortless retro sound makes it feel like we’ve gone back to the future with a soulful mid-Sixties Memphis vibe.
The best songs on Fire It Up sound just like the kind of hits that poured out of Stax, Ardent and Royal Studios way back when – grooving R’n’B that wrote itself into the DNA of American popular music.  Take ‘One Good Turn’ for example – a great blend of horns, guitar, organ and

Genial soul wizard Steve Cropper

Pic by Michael Wilson

piano around a hooky melody that hints at melancholy, with a neat, relaxed guitar solo from Cropper.  It sounds like just the kind of tune from which Springsteen must have drawn ingredients for soul-pop excursions like ‘Hungry Heart’.
Or there’s ‘Far Away’, an infectious, strolling groove that also features a social commentary lyric that's one of the more interesting pieces of wordsmithing on the album, to go with some more nifty guitar breaks from Cropper, a man generally known more as a rhythm guitarist, songwriter and producer than as a fully fledged axeman.  Not that his soloing ever sails off over the horizon here – with thirteen tracks adding up to a total of 39 minutes, Fire It Up is never an exercise in self-indulgence.  (Well, there are notionally 13 tracks – I’ll get back to that.)
‘Heartbreak Street’ and ‘The Go-Getter Is Gone’ are standouts.  There’s that positive feeling of déjà vu about the former, in the sense of a comforting familiarity like putting on a favourite pair of old slippers, and it benefits from a strong chorus that introduces a neat change of direction.  And ‘The Go-Getter Is Gone’ is another pleasing tune, with probably the most energy and brio on the whole album, with wit in the lyric, backed up by a classic horn riff and another vibrant guitar break.
There are a couple of problems though.  One of them is singer Roger C. Reale.  Yes, he sings with authentic soulful grit, and communicates all the melodies with ease.  But for me he doesn’t offer enough personality to bring distinctiveness to some of the songs.  And they need that personality, because over the piece too many tracks feel samey.  ‘Fire It Up’ itself, for example, is bright and jaunty over a lazily shuffling rhythm, but never quite achieves lift-off.  ‘I’m Not Havin’ It’ is more driven, with a pumping groove and something of a strut to it, but it doesn’t really develop enough.  And the same is true of ‘She’s So Fine’, a bit of bouncing R’n’B with a twinkling guitar motif that’s given a push and a shove from the drums, but really needed a stronger bridge to give it a lift, rather as a key change in the middle eight helps to perk up the slower, more reflective ‘Two Wrongs’.  ‘Out Of Love’ is better though, in spite of some perfunctory lyrics, with a laid back groove. a cool, pinging guitar solo, and further assorted licks to match, while all the while it swings like a Sultan.
The album closes with the instrumental ‘Bush Hog’, engagingly built on a rolling, revolving guitar line and staccato horns, with a descending turnaround that feels naggingly familiar.  It’s enjoyable – but I can’t help wondering what the two snippets ‘Bush Hog Part 1’ and ‘Bush Hog Part 2’ add to the equation, the first opening the album and the second preceding ‘Bush Hog’ itself.
Don’t get me wrong, there’s never a bad moment on Fire It Up.  It just feels like it could have done with a bit more wildness thrown into the mix.  A bit more fire in the belly, in fact.

Fire It Up is released by Provogue Records on 23 April.