Morello is destined to be on the Mount
Rushmore of guitarists, but as an electric
guitarist he’s forged an undeniable style
and influenced a generation of guitarists through his Whammy-slamming
work with Rage Against the Machine and
Audioslave.
Thankfully, on
his third solo
album World
Wide Rebel
Songs, The
Nightwatchman
(Morello’s
acoustic
Johnny-Cash-meets-Che-Guevara alter
ego) embraces his amplified roots and
tracks with his touring band, the Freedom
Fighter Orchestra. This ensemble adds
much-needed firepower to Morello’s prounion, freedom-for-all anthems.
From the opening licks of “It Begins
Tonight”—a fiery Audioslave “
Cochise”-style riff on steroids—you instantly know
this isn’t the same workingman troubadour. The song’s solo has the Grammy-winning guitarist going back to his
wah-tastic ways creating a solo fit for Evil
Empire-era RATM. The album’s first single, “Save the Hammer for the Man,” features soulful keyboard laced with steadfast
strumming by Morello and guest guitarist Ben Harper. The song climaxes with
dueling solos: Harper on lap steel and
Morello working his pedalboard pyrotechnics. “Stray Bullets” depicts embittered American soldiers in Iraq accompanied by Morello’s version of Duane Eddy
twang. Fist-pumping songs like “Black
Spartacus Heart Attack Machine” and
“World Wide Rebel Songs” offer a familiar Nightwatchman-esque folk-rock vibe
with sing-along choruses and vigorous
strumming on his “Whatever It Takes”
Ibanez Galvador nylon-string. Slow-paced tracks like the sparse, remorseful
“God Save Us All” and the downtrodden
warning of “The Fifth Horseman of the
Apocalypse” counterweigh the album’s
bombastic rockers.
The instrumentation and compositions on World Wide Rebel Songs show off
Morello’s abilities as an electric wizard
and a soulful singer-songwriter, and the
music’s dynamic range makes this the most
muscular, well-rounded Nightwatchman
album yet. —Chris Kies
David Bromberg
Use Me
Appleseed Recordings
In the mid ’60s, David Bromberg backed
a host of heavyweights—including Bob
Dylan, Jerry Garcia, the Eagles, Ringo
Starr, Willie Nelson, Link Wray, Jorma
Kaukonen, and Jerry Jeff Walker—on
guitar, Dobro, and pedal steel. Bromberg’s
superb acoustic and electric chops and
earthy sound made him one of the East
Coast’s most in-demand accompanists and
session players. By the late ’60s, Bromberg
was running with
the best: When he
released his 1971
debut solo album,
his buddy George
Harrison added
guitar and even
cowrote a song for
the project. After releasing a handful of successful albums—and still at the top of his
game—Bromberg dropped out of the music
business and eventually stopped playing
guitar. Then in 2007, he made a surprise
comeback with his first album in 17 years,
Try Me One More Time, which was nominated for a Grammy.
For his latest release, Use Me, the
66-year-old-string wizard gathered a few
friends in studios around the country to
help him celebrate his return to guitar and
concertizing. And what friends! Levon
Helm, Vince Gill, Los Lobos, Jimmy
Herring and Widespread Panic, Dr. John,
Linda Ronstadt, Keb’ Mo’, Tim O’Brien,
and John Hiatt all join Bromberg for a
track on the album. (Helm and his band
actually join Bromberg for two songs.) Each
guest either wrote a song or picked a cover
for the project, and also agreed to produce
the session.
Whether plucking snappy B.B. King-inspired blues licks with Levon Helm,
laying down shiny slide over Jimmy
Herring’s toothy riffs, or weaving bell-like
flattop lines around Vince Gill’s snappy
mandolin, Bromberg plays with a supple
groove and fat tone. The result is an outstanding mix of bluegrass, country, R&B,
and blues that’s united by Bromberg’s
soulful picking, quirky vocals, and emotional connection to the music, regardless
of the genre. —Andy Ellis
BOOK
Flying V, Explorer,
Firebird
Tony Bacon
Backbeat Books
If the Flying V,
Explorer, and
Firebird are perhaps
a bit too edgy for
your style or current gig now, just
imagine what you
would have thought
when those birds
were launched in 1958 (Flying V, Explorer)
and 1963 (Firebird). “Radical” would’ve
been an understatement. Gear author Tony
Bacon’s latest book explores the history of
these provocative instruments and explains
how they’ve impacted nearly every nontraditional solidbody shape that has come
along since.
Bacon does a great job connecting the
historical dots and trapezoids of this story,
which actually begins fairly soon after
Fender’s introduction of the Esquire in
1950 and Gibson’s rollout of the Les Paul
in 1952. Although on a much smaller scale,
the gear scene back then was very much
like it is today, with builders keeping a close
eye on each other’s stuff, borrowing ideas,
and advancing concepts in the name of
innovation and commerce. The secrecy element was alive back then too, with Gibson
continuing to use the PAF label after being
awarded a patent for Seth Lover’s humbucking pickups, and even putting the wrong
patent number on them for a few years. The
thinking was that competitors equipped
with the proper patent filing would be able
to learn too much about humbucker design.
The book contains hundreds of photographs, patent drawings, and vintage ads
that are alone worth the $25 price tag.
Though lacking the historical perspective
on the nuclear aesthetic of the time that
helped mold these guitars’ shapes as much
as anything else, as well as any new information on the mysterious Moderne (that
was patented and meant to be the third
frame of the new Gibson triptych), this
book is deep when it comes to the official
history and the reverberations of the guitars
in its title. Definitely “must-read” stuff for
Gibson fans. —Joe Coffey
