mail: daniel_fjall@hotmail.com
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dancing down the stony road
Dancing Down The Stony Road Released: 2002 Rating: 9/10 Track listing: 1. Easy Rider/ 2. Stony Road/ 3. Dancing The Blues Away/ 4. Catfish Girl/ 5. Burning Feet/ 6. Slow Dance/ 7. Segway/ 8. Mississippi/ 9. So Lonely/ 10. Heading For The City/ 11. Ride On/ 12. When The Good Lord Talked To Jesus/ 13. Qualified/ 14. Sun Is Rising/ 15. Someday My Peace Will Come/ 16. Got To Be Moving On/ 17. Ain’t Going Down This Way/ 18. Changing Times/ 19. The Hustler/ 20. Give That Girl A Diamond Chris Rea has always been a less talented Mark Knopfler. His rough, low voice and minimalistic guitar playing automatically makes comparisons unavoidable and in addition we also have the atmospheric based arrangements of the songs. Rea never was able to match the Dire Straits leader in either commercial or artistical success, though, and although they may have had different artistic visions, they surely tried to achieve it by similar methods. However, Knopfler put his ambitions high and created albums such as Love Over Gold and Brothers In Arms that was more grand and creative than anything Rea even tried to approach. Knopfler seems to be the better songwriter, better guitarist and better musician overall and made his music sell as well. Always riding at the top of the charts whilst Rea cruised around the top 50, top 40 positions with sporadically hits such as “Julia” and “Fool (If You Think It's over)”. Always being listenable, but perhaps too monotonous (J.J. Cale is probably the only one quite as stubborn as Rea when it comes to sticking to his sound, and obviously a huge influence) and not developed enough. In 2000 something happened, though. Rea was ill, spending his time in hospitals for long periods of time and nearly died. That experience made him turn to the blues, a genre that always had been a big part of his music, if not ever done in its purest form. He seeked a way to express his thoughts and feelings that the hospital stays had grew and found the blues. It resulted in the album Stony Road, and this album, Dancing Down The Stony Road is a double disc version of that album. It is packed with extra material and a quite good DVD documentary about the recordings. With rather simple, but thoughtful, lyrics he goes for a rough, dirty sound with his elegant, delicate and extremely tasteful slide guitar playing in the center along with his voice. A voice that never sounded better before. Everything is just right. The band members sticks to a basic, earthy sound with acoustic instruments such as banjo, steel guitar, harmonica and natural sounding drums. Gone are the synthesizers and modern effects that always played a major part in building up his atmospheric sound in the past. These songs are also very atmospheric and moody, but it’s different now. It sounds more humble and down to earth. A change that I welcome. If one can raise any complaints, it might be that the album is a bit too long and there’s rarely any changes in the sound. But if you are in the right mood you will love it. The performances are strong and the songs are honest and well done. It sounds like Rea, by taking a step back into simpler structures, finally found himself and stepped out of the Knopfler-shadow. Out of the J.J. Cale shadow. Highlights are many and there are no missteps. A truly solid release. Opening “Easy Rider” is about the nurse bringing him morphine against his pains, “Dancing The Blues Away” makes you tap your foot to the great accordion and guitar playing, and ballads like “When The Good Lord Talked To Jesus” and “Someday My Peace Will Come” makes you stop for a moment and listen, think and feel. You might be happy with just owning Stony Road, but this package features many songs that are too good to miss out. And the DVD that follows with it is well worth watching. It has Rea talking about the album, his illness, his thoughts about the blues and you get to see the band rehearse and actually living together. Rea’s best release so far, without a doubt.
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