"If you've got a good management team and you can find a good distributor and a great PR company, it works better than being at a label. If somebody's not working out, you can change it, which you can't always do on a label." - Bonnie Raitt
Slipstream is Bonnie Raitt’s 19th album, most of which she produced in tandem with songwriter and producer Joe Henry released on her own label. After personal upheaval she emerges with an album almost cathartic in documentating all the anguish and rumination that follows loss. She says "I picked these songs so I could play them live, so I can have that [elegiac ballad] groove, or I could play a James Brown song."
Bonnie bounces back recharged from a long release seven year hiatus with Slipstream which features some cover tracks. Gerry Rafferty’s Down the Line is treated to a little reggae twist. The cover is a Hammond B3 driven affair, it’s a brave soul that would attempt to trump the owner of this gem but she pulls it off with confidence and grace. Bob Dylan’s Million Miles from his 1997 Time out of Mind album is a low slung blues track. Her full throated outpourings are perfect for these numbers.
You Can’t Fail me Now was written by Loudon Wainwright and Joe Henry and you can tell it was specifically written for Bonnie. It is reminiscent of the iconic and wonderful ‘I can’t Make you Love me’. She closes the album with Standing in the Doorway – a fabulous snare drum driven track that showcases her distinctive voice. Finally, she closes off with God Only Knows – just Bonnie and a piano.
Low slung blues, raucous rock, skanking reggae - she can’t do any wrong really!
No comments:
Post a Comment