"Act locally, think globally."
~ David Brower from "Friends of the Earth"
"Even though you can't expect to defeat the absurdity of the world, you must make that attempt. That's morality, that's religion. That's art. That's life."
~ Phil Ochs
"In ten years, he'll be yesterday's news."
~ Bob Dylan describing Phil Ochs' first album All The News That's Fit to Sing
"The whole problem can be stated quite simply by asking, 'Is there a meaning to music?' My answer would be, 'Yes.' And 'Can you state in so many words what the meaning is?' My answer to that would be, 'No.'"
~ Aaron Copland
"Huzzah!"
Jake Speed & The Freddies
What kind of band plays songs that strike a familiar set of chords, and sing the local news and resonant history as effectively as Stephen Colbert, Walter Cronkite and Jon Stewart? Long before rap, hip hop, and such Woody Guthrie sang about the immigrants the newspaper failed to name who died while being deported. He wanted to list all the names, since the story was incomplete in the dailies. He knew that newspapers missed the point. He knew that a song told the story better. He knew a song could tell the local story in the context of the local heart and humor. Woody was a lightning rod for that tradition, which began in the time of town criers and lutes in the streets of Europe when words weren't enough to tell the truth hidden in a story. Stories of love and hate just need a song to engage the heart and treat the loss and longing with hope and humor. Jake Speed and The Freddies have taken the commission to sing the songs of Cincinnati from the red head on Clifton to the denial and abdication of responsibility found in the exodus of good folks to the cookie cutter suburbs fleeing the fires and guns of "the fire next time" clash of cultures. Phil Ochs' first record was called, "All The News That's Fit To Sing." He was the singing Jon Stewart of his day. What Phil did for the national news, Jake Speed & The Freddies have done for life in Cincinnati. The chord this little acoustic band tends to strike in local venues near my family and home is that cluster of notes that vibrates when love is applied to Northside, Clifton, downtown and all points Cincinnati, Ohio.
I grew up in the Bay Area in California where the local news that mattered was brought by Country Joe and the Fish, Otis Redding, and Tony Bennett. Maybe I didn't know where a man could sit on the dock of the bay without breaking a law or interrupting the longshoremen, but it was a thrill to hear about a man sitting there feeling something. Tony Bennett had adopted my city, and wasn't born there, but his heart was in the cable cars and Coit Tower, the Mission District, Turk and the Haight. That song about San Francisco gave us courage to say we loved that complex island with it's mix of cultures and classes so often set against itself. I learned to count when Country Joe wrote that song asking, "What are we fighting for?" You've heard of my boyhood local heroes. Any time capsule from that island in the Bay would have to hold their records to be worth unsealing or to matter when the probe reaching intelligent life out beyond the ice of Pluto to put my world in context out among the stars. The sainted belligerent Phil Ochs told the national news in some detail from Haiti to Vietnam with the ironic charm of Will Rodgers and the political analysis of a Mario Savio. Petulant Bob Dylan famously criticized Ochs with the clever phrase, "In ten years he'll be yesterday's news," but his songs have survived as our national taste for military adventurism has kept them relevant. Now that my heart has found a home in Northside Cincinnati, I'd send Huzzah! out on the rocket to the stars in the hope the boys on Alpha Centori and worlds unknown would know we were more than signifying monkeys here on Witler Street near Hamilton 20 minutes from Main and the Ohio River. The Freddies play the heart out of this city. Jake Speed his the voice to set the future straight from the detail of just one love to seasons of flood, fire, tornado, and riot, the climate of a failing economy and the escapades of a government dancing on thin ice and foreign soil.
This Freddies effort is an old style little album sold with a stamp of authenticity emblazened on the disc like a tourist trinket. It's the record of a time and a place sung in detail with all the dazzle of acoustic wood and strings, ensemble harmony, and voice that likes to tell a story. Jake Speed wrote the songs except for one in the tradition which borrows and embellishes from the open songbook of evolving folk to paint a portrait of life on the street and in the homes of working people. Jake's snapshot of the heart of Cincinnati should hang alongside Andrew Wyeth, Edward Hopper and Diane Arbus for it's accuracy and depiction of the light. This band is a treasure. "Huzzah!" will sound fine to young and old right out of the package. I've learned more about Cincinnati listening and looking up references in the songs than in four months living here. Songs aren't written for generic people, not good songs anyway. These songs are written for a city and a people alongside the Ohio River in 2008. That's a social document with a beat.
They got blues riffs played on the mandolin, string bass incidents, slide steeling, Happy Traum guitar picking, harp blowing, kazoo, washboard and watering can hijinks. These local heroes won the 2002 Cincinnati Entertainment Award Artist of the Year and Best Singer/Songwriter award, along with CEA Best Folk Musicians 2001 through 2004, and CityBeat Magazine Best Local Musicians of 2004, and the coveted CAMMY (Cincinnati Area Music Award) for 2003. This album should be the soundtrack to Ken Burn's Cincinnati if he makes such a series. Jake Speed has documented and goosed the imperfect city he and The Freddies live in and love. As Chris put it in a cautionary email, "You are aware that Leavin' Cincinnati is sarcasm, right? We all love this town." I happen to know this town thinks very highly of you all as well. It's a wise choice to write about what you love. Listen to the audience singing better for The Freddies than anybody ever did for Sing Along Mitch, and I think it must be clear the love affair is going strong. These guys are local heroes. If you got a problem with that, alls I got to say is "Huzzah!"
THE SONGS:
1. MARVELOUS YOU takes a bluegrass folk waffle iron to something like Cole Porter's "You're The Top." So it's "Anything Goes" with the comparisons. "If you were a library desk bell, I'd hit on you..." The Buddhists say "Think globally and act locally," which seems about right with "Clifton Heights you" in this Cincinnati song of dedication complete with a Gary Davis song request for "Let Me Lay It On You." The left ear harmonica and that right ear harmonica trade some great solos. There's plenty hidden under the song sheets, since this print making girl referred to as "thee" which rhymes, when "thou" might be more familiar, she'd be "My Fair Lady" as a movie. Is the singer seeking to play a little Pygmalion on the keyboard of the local redhead? Naaaah! This is working class smart. There's nothing here like social climbing. There's an oblique reference to "I Got You Babe," with Cher and that other Bono. Picking up all the detail in these haphazard sounding comparisons is a little like playing "Where's Waldo." I'm still finding stuff.
2. LEAVIN' CINCINNATI is the bluegrass equivalent of white flight tongue in cheek headed out of town to the tune of Rock Around The Clock. "I hear guns. I'm no fool. I'm sending my kids to white suburban schools." I didn't see the reaction first hand in Cincinnati. I was at the Greek Theater watching Lou Reed with buildings burning a day or so after Simi Valley acquitted the cops and later paid Rodney King a chunk of change to whitewash the inequity. I hear tell a Cincinnati man got shot for reaching into his empty pockets. This traveling blues cuts as deep as "Love me, I'm a liberal" did when Phil Ochs sang it years ago. "I'm leaving Cincinnati, 'cause I'm scared of downtown." When the last slide steel lick is slid, and that mandolin pics and strums out the last bluesy note, this song sounds like Country Joe MacDonald wringing the truth out of a traditional rag. Great song damn straight.
3. TEAR IT DOWN RAG is as promised a raggy talking blues. The bluegrass is better but there's a steaming hunk of "1-2-3, what are we fighting for?" lodged in my memory with this style and content. Sure thing the talking blues is an early flat pic rag in anticipation of urban hip hop. Dylan did a spate of talkin' blues about WWIII, John Birch, the Bear Mountain Massacre, Hava Negeilah (that's a foreign song learned in Utah sung for the Goyim) and whatever else came to mind. Chris Bouchillon (b. 08.21/1893 to 09/1968) claims he did it first. Bob Marley recorded an album called "Talkin' Blues." There's always a tongue in every cheek on stage and off with these songs. Subject for this missive is tearing down drug stores. I swear there's more to this song than ripping down a Rite-Aid, Sav-On or any other some such. I'm still hearing Country Joe when Speed sings. Guess I just miss his San Francisco stuff. Where did he go? I think he's in Cincinnati in spirit. Sure thing this Freddies band is better than David Bromberg or Dave Von Ronk.
4. FIRST STREET FELL sings of the time "rich and poor, white and brown" all got along on that street. There was a flood some years back, and there's that picture of a man rowing through Cincinnati. There's more going on here, since "all the mansions on the hill were halfway houses" and so forth. I'm afraid this past is so distant it hasn't happened yet. Time wraps around that way, right? Some reason, we don't know why, that First Street sunk in the muddy waters. There's a First Street at the Ohio River nearly now, but it's not the street here in this song. Things were better then, or will be.
5. FARE THEE WELL my own true love. It's a love song. A short trip on a plane after a short good bye, and an in-flight phone call were all the fare well this parting got before an untimely end. The lyric fiddle playing in this song keeps it simple as a heart beat. "I said to my love I'll be flyin' in the morn. My trip won't take long. You won't even know I'm gone." That small story one man on a short trip with his true love speaking the time honored old school phrase "Fare thee well my own true love" would make a sweet song if the context were no more than a business trip. It's a day in the life. "I arrived at the airport about a quarter of eight / September was the month. Eleven was the date. As I waited for the airplane to roll down the line, I smiled and I thought of that true love of mine. Fare thee well, fare thee well, fare thee well my own true love."
6. OLD MAN JOE begins with guitar and banjo taking me out to the ball game. "Get out the way for Old Man Joe. He's rounding third and heading for home. Get out the way for Old Man Joe. When he hits home, he's gonna be running." This is a spirited guitar, fiddle and banjo tribute to the youngest Major League Baseball player admitted to the league when he was 15. He played for Cincinnati and lived in Hamilton.
FROM: The Cincinnati Enquirer ~
By Kevin Kelly
Hamilton native Joe Nuxhall, who as a 15-year-old in
1944 made history by pitching for the Reds and later
became a fixture in the Reds radio booth, died at 10:55
p.m. Thursday night at Mercy Hospital-Fairfield.
He was 79.
One of the most beloved figures in Cincinnati's rich
baseball history, Nuxhall was admitted to Mercy
Hospital-Fairfield on Monday for pneumonia, a low
pulse rate and low white blood count. Thursday morning,
doctors postponed surgery to insert a pacemaker
because of Nuxhall's low pulse, his son Kim Nuxhall
said.
.
The Ol' Left-hander, as he came to be known to scores
of Reds fans, spent six decades with the team as a
player and radio broadcaster until retiring after the 2004
season. Working under a personal services contract with
the Reds, he broadcast selected games during the 2007
season.
7. OHIO RIVER WALTZ takes a trip back to the "rabbit patch days" along the Ohio River with "you." The songs back then were "Deep Denim Blues" and "California Blues." There were some good times at Coney Island but this song is a return to the Ohio River. "I've rambled, I've roamed, but I'm headed back home to the Ohio River and you." In some sense, this is a trip back to a river of time that may be a few years under the bridge. Cincinnati has retained some of its buildings and character. There's a fine strummed mandolin solo in this one.
There's a misquote in the paragraph above. I could fix it and sound smart, but a little honesty is better than a pound of audacity. Here's the correction from producer and bass player Chris:
"There is one mis-quote though. On 'Ohio River Waltz' it's Rabbit Hash, not rabbit patch. This is significant because Rabbit Hash is a little town (VERY little) that sits on the Ohio, west of Cincy on the Kentucky side. You should google it and read about it. Or better yet go there on some Sunday afternoon when they have a band in the General Store. It's quite an experience."
Forget your Conde Nast guide. Jake Speed & The Freddies sing the insider's guide to the region. See you all in Rabbit Hash! That's the Freddies Experience. Are you experienced? Have you ever been to Rabbit Hash?
8. HARD TIMES AT MY DOOR is close to Stephen Foster's "Hard Times (Come Again No More)" with local and current references that make is a song about these hard times and not some other. The spirit of this rendition is Woody Guthrie. The conflict is black and white and brown, but "we all know green is the only color in town." The Foster song is reworked in track 13. Seems this song is always in style.
9. POOR JOHNNY more than likely tells a true story of a boy who wasn't perfect but shouldn't have been shot. His two brothers had died and his father was gone. His mother in this fine song asks him to stay alive, too many having been lost. Johnny reassures his mother "they won't get me." The ending is ironic and tragic. Johnny reassures his mother, the bullet wasn't meant for him. "Momma don't worry, they're never gonna get me." Wish it had been so. My search for the boy named John killed in a drive-by among four others came up inconclusive. There are too many shootings to chose from. This song sent me on that search. It's dead bang accurate, sorry to say. Too many have died. We still don't get along.
10. SITTING ON TOP OF THE WORLD is a Walter Vinson (also known as Walter Jacobs) song. Walter claimed he wrote this song after playing a white dance in Greenwood, Mississippi. Tommy Johnson sued him over the music, and that was settled out of court over similarities to Big Road blues. The irony of sitting on top of the world after the girl has gone stings a little more after the lawsuit, I have no doubt. The "Mississippi Shieks" recorded the song for Okeh and had a cross-over hit. This song was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2008.
Anyway you slice it, this song has the power to keep curiosity going after all these years. The song is just right, but it's meaning may change with your own mood. That's classic. Great writing and a fine version sung here.
11. VOLVO GIRL has the clumpity clump of a car needs work in the guitar intro and general feel. The style of is all Everly Brothers enough to be a tribute to the sibling crooners. There may be a double meaning here. Once that car gets started, it never stops, if you take my meaning. Hard to get started though. "V-O-L-V-O she's my Volvo girl." She sings, but her radio got broke. Sweet.
12. STREETVIBES RAG "Streetvibes" is the magazine you can buy for $1.00 on the streets of Cincinnati and other cities.
The Greater Cincinnati Coalition for the Homeless offers the following description of the paper and its purpose:
"Streetvibes is an award winning alternative newspaper and part of the international street newspaper movement. Focusing on homelessness and social justice issues, Streetvibes reports the often-invisible story of poverty in our community. Streetvibes is also proud to include creative writing, poetry, articles, photography and interviews written by homeless and formerly homeless individuals. As a progressive news source Streetvibes serves an educational function, and also provides a forum for dialogue for those often left unseen and unheard."
This song is short, like an ad for the disenfranchised. Call it a PSA. The guitar picking is close to "Alice's Restaurant" with a hint of Happy Traum. The clipped sound of a strummed mandolin gives the feeling of a yuke. "Pick you up one today!"
13. HARD TIMES COME NO MORE is the rousing update on the Stephen Foster song seen through the voice of Woody Guthrie. The harp playing makes this song sound like a street busker's theme song. That's a great harmonica. This song has a long tradition. Dylan covered it and rewrote it. It's Foster's song, but he'd be happy to see it kept up. The tradition is to revise. This is a tradition rendition of a song given to the times.
14. SONG FOR LIBBA Elizabeth "Libba" Cotten wrote the song Freight Train which was covered by Peter, Paul & Mary among many others. Her tunings and picking style on standard guitar flipped for left-handed picking were dubbed "Cotten Picking." This song is a fine tribute to Libba. "You'll never be forgotten, Elizabeth Cotten." That picking style is familiar. That's Cotten Picking Jake Speed.
The lyrics to Freight Train are incorporated into this song. They are worth repeating.
FREIGHT TRAIN
by Elizabeth Cotten
Freight train, freight train, run so fast
Freight train, freight train, run so fast
Please don't tell what train I'm on
They won't know what route I'm going
When I'm dead and in my grave
No more good times here I crave
Place the stones at my head and feet
And tell them all I've gone to sleep
When I die, oh bury me deep
Down at the end of old Chestnut Street
So I can hear old Number Nine
As she comes rolling by
When I die, oh bury me deep
Down at the end of old Chestnut Street
Place the stones at my head and feet
And tell them all I've gone to sleep
Freight train, freight train, run so fast
Freight train, freight train, run so fast
Please don't tell what train I'm on
They won't know what route I'm going
15. TALKIN' F-WORD BLUES revisits the talking blues best known for the crossover sound of Arlo Guthrie's "Alices Restaurant" but found by the bucketful throughout folk. Dylan's "John Birch Blues" is somewhere in the neighborhood here. We don't have the commies to kick around anymore, so the mantle has fallen to the French. The F-word here is "French." Seems our boy ordered fries, toast and stuff with the F-word in the forefront. This style of song best uncovers lunacy, and Jake Speed has skewered the right insubstantial national nut ball idea in the vilification of all things Franco.
Here's a piece of American history for you:
On 11 March 2003, Representatives Robert W. Ney (R-Ohio) and Walter B. Jones, Jr. (R-North Carolina) declared that all references to French fries and French toast on the menus of the restaurants and snack bars run by the House of Representatives would be removed. House cafeterias were ordered to rename French fries "freedom fries".
People were dying.
Another bit of news:
LAKE GEORGE---The tentacles of public corruption in the Republican party do indeed extend from Washington all the way into Lake George as was validated Friday with Congressman Robert W. Ney (R-Ohio), pleading guilty to a two-county criminal information charging him with conspiracy to commit multiple offenses.
16. OHIO RIVER BLUES (LIVE AT CODY'S CAFE) played live. The choral work is done by fans in the honorary Freddie chorus for the night. The kind of band that can sing an original song as a sing along is the Jack Speed & The Freddies accomplishment. Good songs repeat something for that purpose, truth be told. Go ahead and try that kind of enthusiasm at home. It won't get you arrested.
FROM JAKE SPEED & THE FREDDIES' WEBSITE:
Jake Speed & the Freddies are a four-piece American folk, country blues, and ragtime band made out of flat top guitar, banjo, mandolin, and upright bass (plus harmonica, kazoo, washboard, and watering can). The Freddies traditionalist approach has won them the respect of fellow musicians, music lovers, and even critics. The readers of CityBeat Magazine voted them Best Local Musicians in 2004. The listeners of WNKU FM 89.7 voted The Freddies second album, Cincinnati Legends of Jeremiah. Schmidt, ..29 of their Top 89 Albums of 2003. The band is a four-time winner of the Cincinnati Entertainment Award (2001, 2002, 2003, & 2004) for Best Folk Musicians. They also won the 2002 CEA for Artist of the Year and Best Singer/Songwriter. Their winning of Best Folk Vocalist and Best Folk Band at the 2003 CAMMYs (Cincinnati Area Music Awards) put them on the definitive road of folk music in Cincinnati.
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