SUPERSTITIONS: KNOCK ON WOOD

Now that we all know that it is often hard surfaces that carry the droplet particles we excrete contracted coronavirus out and about into the population, arguably this ain't such a good good luck charm. Unless we ritually wash our hands thereafter, for the required two minutes whilst singing a suitable song. So may I assume that given as an adjunct to this post?

As to why knocking on wood, or even just touching wood, should confer positive outcomes, this stems back to the days when it was believed that spirits and deities lived in trees, and so a way of making contact. Somehow seems a more tactile expression of faith than just projecting your thoughts into the ether, maybe why christianity appropriated the superstition, with a slight sleight, with the idea of it stemming from the tapping the wooden beams of the cross of the crucifixion. Made from, thus, a dead tree, clearly giving a mixed message to the noviciates transferring over from paganism.

Be all that as it may, clearly the authors, Steve Cropper, guitarist of Booker T's MGs, and soul singer Eddie Floyd, thought it a potent totem for their 1966 chart hit, themselves then muddling matters up with its talk of thunder and lightning, forgetting what also "touches" wood in a thunderstorm. But their luck duly held, the song was a hit for Floyd, hitting number 28 on the Billboard chart, even better, 19, in the UK., and is now an acknowledged star in the Stax firmament.

But it didn't end there, with, to date, well over a hundred and twenty covers, spanning many styles and genres. Cropper himself reprised the song for an often overlooked album, Jammed' In, a trio effort between himself, Pops Staples and Albert King. I commend the album. Floyd also repeated himself, as part of the Blues Brothers circus of films and tours. (And, yes, I am sure that is also Cropper in that clip, his face often inconveniently masked by the neck of the bass guitar.)

David Bowie, on his exit from the Ziggy/Aladdin years, famously went funky, or his manifestation thereof, and David, Live, the live showcase of the Young Americans style, produced this version. The backing is all a bit loopier than the precision of original Muscle Shoals studio setting, the vocals all over the shop. Not originally included in the album, it was released as a single in Britain, hitting a very reasonable number 10 in the chart during 1974.

Which wasn't a patch on the 1978 version by Amii Stewart, made during some down time from musical touring duties in London's theatreland. This never more disco, syndrums to the fore, version became a worldwide smash, a number one in her American home territory. Whilst I was way too cool to ever then admit to liking either her version or disco music in general, I certainly recall her performance/outfit enlivening episodes of Top of the Pops. So huge was the song in the clubs that, when the film of Studio 54, 54, was made, in 1998, it was Stewart's showstopping performance that was reimagined as a set piece performance for the film, if pseudonymised. I have never worked out quite why a song with such subject matter should be so successful with the often largely gay clientele of such clubs, most of the surrounds being metallic. (Yeah, right.)

I would have liked to have found a really out there version to finish with; sadly this wasn't to be. So iconic is the song and so distinctive the riff that none seem to stray from the rigidity of the template. However, I confess to liking this version by James Taylor, as much for the smile on his face as he sings it, acknowledging just how great a song it is.

Knock, knock.....

LARGE NUMBERS: MILLION(S): A Million Tears/Kasey Chambers

Folk seem to be suggesting there aren't that many songs about millions, so it was with some relief I tapped into my i-pod search and and found, well, over a handful, mainly to do with miles, dollars or, as this one, tears. And delighted too I was to find this song, an artist I had somehow forgotten about of late, and, indeed, seems also to have been overlooked in the wider world of fame and fortune. Time to discover!

Kasey burst on to my consciousness back in the late 90's, in her 20's, her debut coming at me with a blast of raw, gutsy heartfelt C&W pathos. Country and western australia that is, as she hailed from,(actually south) australia, rather than the West Texas Lucinda tinted tones she reminded me of, albeit a younger and more innocent Lucinda. Her first album, 'The Captain',  was an absolute scorcher, if one discounts her years of active service in her 'family" band, honing her chops under the capable supervision of her father, himself a name in australiana. It probably did no harm that world famous in my world, hopefully yours,  husband and wife duo, Buddy and Julie Miller, were involved. Indeed, she soon eclipsed his custodianship, a run of records alerting her to international ears, with, notably, a duet with the aforesaid Lucinda appearing on her 2nd solo outing. Hell, her first 2 tours of the USA were supporting, first, Lucinda and, secondly, Emmylou Harris. The 2nd album, 'Barricades and Brickwalls', took her further, if not a better record, getting close to the sales of another australian, sales wise. The titular song from this piece comes from said album.

I was sort of surprised, whilst researching this piece, that she has a subsequent 9 releases, many performing just as well. Somehow these didn't seem to hit the radars I rely on back in the UK. I was aware she had married, and that she had become a duo with her husband, one Shane Nicholson, but none of their material had intrigued. They have since separated. The good news is that she has this year produced a new album, 'Dragonfly', which, on a first spotify, sounds and seems well much a return to form.

I feel bad suggesting there has been a fall away from grace, as, for all I know, maybe there hasn't been, but, irrespective, she's back on my register and I commend her to yours.

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Discoveries: Not Pretty Enough

Kasey Chambers: Not Pretty Enough

[purchase]

I've told this story a hundred times over.  I've told it on my own site more than once.  I even got the chance to tell Kasey Chambers this story in person backstage at the Bijou Theatre in Knoxville in August of last year.

Still... for this week... for this theme... I feel the need to tell it again.  It's not just the story of how I discovered Australian songbird Kasey Chambers, it's also the story of how I came to discover Americana music in general, start working as an Americana DJ, start writing an Americana blog, and generally become obsessed the genre in general.

Here's what I wrote on my site back in September of 2008.

In the spring of 2002, I was working as a Graduate Assistant at Morehead State Public Radio in Morehead, Kentucky. I mostly worked in the newsroom writing news and sports copy and anchoring the occasional newscast. On Friday nights, it was my job to sit in the broadcast studio and make sure nothing went wrong while we aired a few nationally syndicated music programs. Essentially, I would introduce a program, do nothing for an hour, and then introduce the next program.

I spent most of those Friday nights chatting with friends on line, making fantasy baseball trades, or just reading and doing classwork. Every so often, however, I would actually listen to the shows I was airing. One night, on a show called E-Town, I heard the voice of an Australian country singer named Kasey Chambers. The down under twang in her voice was unlike anything I had ever heard before. I wasn't sure what I was hearing... but I knew I liked it.

The next week, I asked the music director at the station if he had ever heard of this Kasey Chambers person. He started raving about this thing called "Americana Music" and how great it was and how great Kasey Chambers was, and he gave me a copy of her CD, Barricades and Brickwalls that had just been released in the U.S. I still wasn't sure what this Americana thing was he kept talking about, but I took the CD home for a listen. I had no idea at the time what that CD would lead me to.

I pushed play and was immediately met with the ominous guitar riff of the title track followed by Kasey's distinctive vocal twang. I was immediately hooked. The song itself is a meditation on obsession. Kasey runs through a laundry list of things that have been placed between her and the object of her desires. Barricades and brickwalls, iron bars and big ol' cars, locked doors, screaming and shouting... nothing will hold her back. In the chorus, she makes her intentions clear by declaring, "I'll be damned if you're not my man before the sun goes down."

The rocking title track is followed by the softer "Not Pretty Enough" (the song that got my attention from the E-Town broadcast) and continues to mix ballads like "On a Bad Day" and "Nullarbor Song" with country weepers like "A Little Bit Lonesome" and "Still Feeling Blue" and alt-country blueprints like "Runaway Train" and "If I Were You."

Each time I listened to the disc and read through the liner notes, I heard something different and discovered something new. The album became my gateway drug into Americana music. It was my introduction to Buddy Miller, who provided backing vocals on "Runaway Train." I heard Lucinda Williams for the first time on "On a Bad Day." The album also introduced me to Gram Parsons with Kasey's cover of Parsons' "Still Feeling Blue."

Not long after I fell in love with the album, I discovered that Kasey would be appearing at a taping of The Mountain Stage just a few hours up the road in Charleston, West Virginia. Of course, I wanted to go see the show. I didn't even care that I also had to sit through listing to four other artists who I had never heard of. Of course... those artists turned out to be Laura Cantrell, Dar Williams, James McMurtry, and Rodney Crowell with Kenny Vaughn.

Holy Cow! How could one artist and one album expose me to so many other artists who would all become such staples of my music collection just a few short years later? I don't know... but Kasey Chambers did it.

I first heard Kasey Chambers and Barricades and Brickwalls in the early months of 2002. That summer, I began hosting Morehead State Public Radio's nightly Americana program one night a week. The story goes on from there. Who knows what might have happened to me and my musical tastes without this album?