Soul Of A Man
Little Axe – Bought For A Dollar/Sold For A DimeEcho Beach – EB 133CVinyl, LP, Album, Reissue, Remastered, Germany, Sep 2018(original release: digital 2008/CD 2010)
This is the 2018 vinyl version of Little Axe's sixth LP, Bought For A Dollar/Sold For A Dime. Skip McDonald's blues-dub-hip hop hybrid "band" again features the rest of Tackhead (Doug Wimbish on bass, Keith LeBlanc on drums, and a mixdown by On-U Sound main man Adrian Sherwood) on nearly every track. But this is Skip's show, with the guitarist leading the group in some subtly different directions on their second set of recordings after signing to Peter Gabriel's Real World Records. Bought For A Dollar... is probably the slickest and most commercial sounding Little Axe production, but that's not a critique (and it may be my favorite of their records).
Cutting to the chase: it's a remarkable record. I promise you'll love it with no background, history lessons, or color commentary required. (Read: Feel free to skip to the links without spending another minute on my babbling!)
Almost without fail, playing Little Axe outloud will cause someone to ask me we're listening to. I think it's the contradictions that catch people's attention: Little Axe records manage to pull on classic musical threads from before our time but sound unmistakably modern (or occasionally from the future). Instantly familiar themes are wrapped up in music that doesn't quite sound like anything else I know of. A guitarist's record that focuses on atmosphere rathet than his guitar playing, never turning into showcases for showoff solos. Traditional blues and gospel aren't used as a gimmick or awkwardly jammed into a clever new "fusion" style. Instead of traditional songs being treated as museum pieces or academic history lessons, they are built off of and played with by a group of musicians who both respect those roots and happen to have been central creators of the very language and grammar of hip hop and modern popular music. These records are just good.
By the early 90s, Skip McDonald was already a veteran, a session musician who'd backed damn near everyone under the sun and a creative force in his bands and productions. Stepping into the spotlight and starting Little Axe, he dove back into the blues that he learned and listened to growing up in Ohio. But McDonald and his collaborators made the journey to Dayton with no unnecessary nostalgia and brought New York, Connecticut, London and Kingston along with them. Mississippi delta sounds met dub mixes, reggae rhythms, hip hop production, rock and electronics. Skip McDonald consciously builds off the broad history of Black music in America and the wider diaspora, not making a dramatic turn in direction to start playing the folk circuit or something but proudly building off his years in Wood, Brass & Steel, the Sugar Hill Band, African Head Charge, Tackhead and more.
By the time of Bought For A Dollar/Sold For A Dime, Little Axe was less reliant on the hazy atmospheres and samples from dusty old 78s that made such an impression on earlier recordings. This shift brought the songs more into focus and I think this album has some of McDonald's strongest songwriting. He strips things down to an explosive, gospel infused, blues rock featuring mostly his own original songs. Skip McDonald sings lead on two of these tracks, the great Bernard Fowler on the rest, and backing vocalists include the women from Akabu. (These guys have connections: Among the tracks left off from the CD edition is one with guest vocals by reggae legend Ken Booth.)
Hip hop and reggae influences are still there even with the mix and samples reigned in. They're not just in LeBlanc's beats and Sherwood's occasional waves of echo, you also hear that background as McDonald treats the blues and his own past works as riddims to reuse and songs to "remix." Grinning is a take on a song by Son House, one of Skip McDonald's inspirations for Little Axe. In Another Friend Gone, the gospel standard How Great Thou Art and a line snatched from a Bim Sherman classic ride over a Little Axe beat, building something new (presumably in tribute their sometimes collaborator Sherman who had passed in 2000). Take A Stroll reworks a Tackhead cut from almost 20 years earlier and at least three other songs are new takes on songs from earlier Little Axe recordings. And Hammerhead is maybe the song that proves everyone should be angry at every crappy band that we've ever heard who caused us all to cringe when I typed the words "blues rock" earlier.
The album has had an odd release history: It was first issued in 2008 as a 9 track digital download-only set for subscribers to a new audiophile digital music service sold by Real World and the Bowers & Wilkins speaker company. That was followed in 2010 with Real World's commercial CD release, with a new mix and seven addition tracks. Just a few years ago, the German On-U Sound disciples at Echo Beach issued the album on vinyl for the first time, pressing up 500 copies of the LP, but only including only eight of those fourteen tracks.
But what an eight tracks they are... You can still find cheap copies of this for sale online. I really hope someone out there enjoys this. If you do, grab a copy. It's a good pressing of a great album and the brilliant cover art is worth the price of admission on the vinyl!
I worked at this recording for good while before noticing a small persistent buzz in the right channel during the quiet bits... I was tempted to not even bother sharing it. My wife says I am often tempted to be an idiot. So until I do get around to figuring out where it came from in my system, re-recording the record, and starting all over, here it is anyway... (Yes, I know most of you won't even hear it and there isn't even really a "most of you," but regardless, it drives me crazy. Sigh.)
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I usually listen to something different almost every day, but there was about six months when Little Axe never left my stereo. And just like you said, whenever someone heard it they wanted to know who it was. Except for my wife and kids.
ReplyDeleteThat's funny. My wife and kids (to varying degrees) can all get with Little Axe. Actually, the night you posted this comment, I was playing that album in the kitchen. My wife came in, heard it, and actually asked me "this Little Axe, right?" Made my day. Pretty much anything that I know in life that's worth knowing, I learned from her. So I've still got a hefty debt on that front and you can make a decent case that this doesn't exactly qualify as a "critical life lesson" or whatever... but turning someone onto Skip McDonald ain't nothing, right?
DeleteIf people enjoyed this album, please let me know- I can definitely make a plan for more Little Axe sometime soon if anyone is interested. ...Might not be enough for six months' straight listening like Jonder needed, but there's plenty to choose that would be worth keeping in your regular rotation. Thanks!