With dancing
drums like a legendary New Orleans funeral band, brass full of soul, guitars
that fuse every style of blues and folk, Hugh Coltman has built himself a
sublime backdrop for these eleven songs recorded in New Orleans and produced by
Freddy Koella (Bob Dylan, Willy DeVille, Odetta, kd lang, Carla Bruni, Francis
Cabrel…), over which his warm
journeyman's voice expresses his deep understanding of human emotions and
sentiments, an indulgent listen for evening lovers, loners at dawn or the
melancholic listener at midday... Who’s Happy?, his new album asks. Everyone
and no-one, he seems to reply...
"When I
started writing I had no idea where I was going other than saying to myself
that I wasn't going to become a tribute artist, although there were some
intriguing possibilities." The turning point came with the series Treme and
its many musical treasures. It brought back happy childhood memories including
Kid Ory, Sidney Bechet, Fats Domino, Dr John and the Meters without ever
realising that they too had their roots in the New Orleans of the "second
line" and flamboyant brass bands. He listened passionately to the great
masters of the past, immersed himself in CW Stoneking, the Australian blues
revivalist, and Charles Sheffields, an iconic Louisiana r’n’b singer from the
60s. He quickly developed a liberating conviction: “New Orleans music is not
all about virtuosity; the primal call comes first”.
And a key
existential notion: "I'm forty-five years old, isn't it time I stopped
caring what other people think?" So he went where he wanted to go, to New
Orleans, to breathe in the spirit of Marc Ribot y los Cubanos Postizos, the
piano of Rubén González in Buena Vista Social Club or the atmospheres of Tom
Waits' Swordfishtrombones – strong emotions, honest playing, smoky wisdom and a
harsh reality transformed into joyful music…
He wanted a
lot of musicians, he was looking for that sound he'd already heard in Kid Ory,
Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf – that instinct, the processional brass, the
feeling the listener gets from being in the room with the musicians... Behind
the drums, he wanted Raphaël Chassin, his faithful collaborator who has worked
with Miossec, Vanessa Paradis, Bernard Lavilliers, Charlotte Savary and Albin
de la Simone and more. And guitarist Freddy Koella, the most prestigious and
modest Frenchman in America (Bob Dylan, Willy DeVille, Odetta, kd lang, Carla
Bruni, Francis Cabrel, Lhasa De Sela, etc.).
Freddy was
co-producing the album. He told Hugh: "Don't record any demos." The
result: “In two weeks, I had the foundations for all the songs”, recorded on
his phone in his kitchen in Montreuil. His first week in Louisiana was spent
meeting the musicians and catching up on stories from Trump's America, which
would lead to the song Sugar Coated Pill. Then came six days in the studio with
some of New Orleans' biggest names to record ten new songs and a cover of It’s
Your Voodoo Working by Charles Sheffield.
From one
song to the next, the album moves from autobiography to humanity, from despair
to blind hope, from European blues to universal light... Civvy Street opens the
album sounding like a venerable standard, All Sleeps Away speaks of Hugh
Coltman's father's struggle with Alzheimer's, Little Big Man is written for his
son, Hand Me Down looks at questions of transmission (with French vocals from
Canadian-Haitian singer Mélissa Laveaux)… It's a musical and existential
journey somewhere between a confessional and the big stage, between the
exploration of an extraordinary heritage and the boundless inspiration of an
artist at the height of his creative powers.
The digital
version contains 2 bonus tracks – Losers Blues and If You Were Mine.
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