Dion DiMucci returns: He's collaborated with Bruce Springsteen, Lou Reed, Dave Edmunds, Paul Simon and Phil Spector, spanned the decades with chart topping #1 hits, beat a nasty heroin addiction and lived to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Is it Gene Simmons? Ron Wood? Gordon Lightfoot? Alvin and the Chipmunks? No, it's Dion DiMucci, my iPod-rattled friend, a '50s crooner turned '60s folkie turned modern day rock 'n' roll revivalist.

"A lot of people think I grew up with rock 'n' roll, but I didn't," Dion recalls. "When I was growing up, there was no rock 'n' roll.  I grew up on Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, Jimmy Reed and Hank Williams.  When I first heard this stuff, it was like it was from outer space, because in my neighborhood it was all Jimmy Roselli and Julius LaRosa. But the truth and honesty in this music spoke to me, and I fell in love with it. When I was in seventh, eighth and ninth grade, I couldn't wait to get out of school so I could sit on the stoop with Willie Green, who was the superintendent of one of the tenement buildings in my neighborhood, and listen to his John Lee Hooker records."

Hot on the heels of his blues-filled 2005 release, Bronx In Blue, Dion returns with more earthen gems on Son Of Skip James. But where Bronx In Blue was a Spartan affair with the master storyteller covering ancient blues tunes with only his guitar as companion, Son Of Skip James adds what sounds like a brawling bar band, giving Dion something to wrap his mellow pipes around and his rangy talent against.

"I did Bronx In Blue," Dion explains, "because I had been singing these songs in dressing rooms and soundchecks and people's houses for all these years, and my friends kept asking 'Why don't you record some of those songs?' I remember Bonnie Raitt telling me in 1968 that I should do an album of these songs, and Steve Van Zandt was on my case about it for years. But I always resisted the idea, because I felt like I'd be treading on sacred ground. I finally came around to it, and people really responded, and that made me think, 'Wow, I should have done this a long time ago.' I still had all these other songs in my head, so I thought, 'OK, I'll do another one, but let's do this one a little different.'"

Son Of Skip James is a blues and roll record, plain and simple, evidenced by lowdown covers of Skip James' "Devil Got My Woman," Junior Wells' "Hoodoo Man Blues," Willie Dixon's "Hoochie Coochie Man," and Robert Johnson's "Preachin' Blues" and "If I Had Possession (Over Judgment Day)." Dion also ramps up convincing versions of Chuck Berry's "Nadine" and Bob Dylan's "Baby I'm In The Mood For You."

"Nadine" is gospelized demon rock, driven by Dion's still yearning vocal and urgent, stomping acoustic guitar. It's an ordinary enough song, just a rollicking blues number borne of Jimmie Johnson's paddlewheel piano and Chuck Berry's penchant for under age girls. But Dion remakes the chestnut at his own pace, reveling in its shimmie, enjoying its archaic 1/8th note pulse. It's pure rock and roll from another century, like a clandestine message from a long lost AM radio. Pre-digital, pre-television even, it's the sound of Americana at its most true.

"Nadine"  (MP3, 3:33)

 

How far is history?: Before they sold millions of records, dominated the stage touring with Willie Nelson, Carlos Santana, and the Rolling Stones, and won a Grammy for the hit single "Heaven," Los Lonely Boys were just another Texas bar band playing for tips and sleeping in their van. Live At Blue Cat Blues - Dallas Texas showcases the trio for all they were worth back in 2000. Check out these seminal versions of "Heaven, "Friday Night" and "I Don't Wanna Lose Your Love." Currently in the studio with producer Steve Jordan, Los Lonely Boys prove that the blues are here to stay.

Los Lonely Boys
"Heaven" (mp3)
from "Live At Blue Cat Blues - Dallas Texas"
(Blue Cat Blues Records)

More On This Album

Los Lonely Boys
"Friday Night" (mp3)
from "Live At Blue Cat Blues - Dallas Texas"
(Blue Cat Blues Records)

More On This Album

Los Lonely Boys
"I Don't Wanna Lose Your Love" (mp3)
from "Live At Blue Cat Blues - Dallas Texas"
(Blue Cat Blues Records)

More On This Album