Release Date: March 15, 2011
Black Joe Lewis & The Honeybears aren’t wrestling with the sophomore slump on their follow-up to Tell ‘Em What Your Name Is! If anything, they are improving. Singer and guitarist Joe Lewis sounds like the bastard child of James Brown and Muddy Waters, and damn if the grooves on this record don’t seem to smoke as it spins.The cuts alternate slow, simmering blues jams and electric big band rave-ups, all led by a living lightning bolt in the person of Lewis.
Lewis famously started with the fervor and passion of his live approach and saved the whole “learning to play thing” for the process. But he’s not an idiot savant, he’s a bluesman savant. For instance, “Mustang Ranch” starts off like a Blues Brothers opening number, but Lewis ventures into Wesley Willis territory as he details his efforts to get his “ham glazed” with only $20 dollars in hand. Similarly, “Ballad of Jimmy Tanks” is anything but a ballad, so perhaps the title was chosen ironically.
Throughout, “Black Joe” sounds like he’s about to jump back and kiss himself, and utters sounds that haven’t been heard since Eddie Murphy dipped his toe into James Brown’s hot tub in the ’80s. Phonetically, he sounds something like this: “Yeaych-oww! Too hot!”
Guitarist Zach Ernst met Lewis when he booked him to play a show at his college and needed to assemble a backing band from there, and the sextet known as The Honeybears grew from there. In addition to Ernst, The Honeybears currently include Matt Strmiska, Ian Varley, Bill Stevenson, Jason Frey, Derek Phelps and Joe Woullard. After opening for Spoon on tour, Spoon drummer Jim Eno produced their debut and is back behind the board on this release
Scandalous kicks off with the James Browniest of all of these numbers; whereas Axl Rose may have welcomed his audience to the jungle, Black Joe Lewis wants to know what it’s like “Livin’ In The Jungle,” and clearly there’s a lot of blues and swing, and a rainforest of horns.
This release is “all killer, no filler” from back to front, but “You Been Lyin’” is a passionate highlight. This retort to Lewis’s “baby” comes on like a combo of Rare Earth and Grass Roots (think “No Time Left For You”) and features some soulful backing vocals from The Relatives, including some sinewy “shoo-dee-wops.”
“Booty City” distills the passion of The Rolling Stones’ “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” into a celebration of all things bootylicious delivered with the glee of Rare Earth’s “I Just Want To Celebrate” with a sax solo that borders on Clarence Clemons’ finger nimbleness. Lewis’s raspiness is at his most scat-tastic on the fiery “Black Snake,” whereas the ominous electric guitar line in “She’s So Scandalous” could be taken from a blaxploitation soundtrack like Shaft or Superfly—too bad it wasn’t around for Quentin Tarantino’s Jackie Brown.
The rootsiest moment here is the back-porch Icky Thump-like stomp of “Messin.’” It sounds like Robert Johnson messing around on his acoustic guitar, and has an outtake-like feel, but it’s definitely worthy of inclusion.
“Since I Met You Baby” simmers slowly like a fine pot of down-home jambalaya, and although “Jesus Took My Hand,” opens like a Cream-y Humble Pie, it is best paralleled to the marching electric blues of Zeppelin’s “When the Levee Breaks,” and provides a rousing conclusion to these 11 cuts.
Is Scandalous the most original, creative music ever committed to tape? No, but that’s not the point. Black Joe Lewis & The Honeybears have again proven there’s every reason to revisit the tropes of electric blues and big-band boogie, and exercise can produce steamy, groovy and thoroughly entertaining results.
Black Joe Lewis & The Honeybears – Scandalous Tracklist:
- “Livin’ In the Jungle”
- “I’m Gonna Leave You”
- “Booty City”
- “Black Snake”
- “She’s So Scandalous”
- “Messin'”
- “Mustang Ranch”
- “You Been Lyin'”
- “Ballad of Jimmy Tanks”
- “Since I Met You Baby”
- “Jesus Took My Hand”
