Jack Butwell – I Love Florida
I’m guessing that most people who read the above name and title have heard of only the state, but not the man who loved it. Some facts are in order: Canadian Jack Butwell moved to the Sunshine State in 1960. In keeping with the traditional family business of earthen materials (Butwell brickyards date back to the 1880s in Ontario), he set up shop as Butwell Stone & Soil.
A country music enthusiast, Jack also wrote and performed his own songs, releasing numerous singles and one album, I Love Florida. Any fan of NRBQ is acquainted with at least one of Butwell’s songs, as the band recorded his “12 Bar Blues” for their Grooves In Orbit album and made it a staple of their live repertoire for nearly two decades.
Via their newsletter, NRBQ highly recommended sending away for this album upon its original release. I did. They were right. A more heartfelt batch of songs you’ll not find. It’s filled with the exuberance of his semi-amateur status as well as his never cloying, always sincere and believable songs.
Butwell had a couple musical pals he’d play with locally around his hometown of Punta Gorda, and when he had some new songs ready, they’d go into the studio, sometimes bringing in extra players and singers. No one seems to remember who the woman singing with him on “Woman With A Shovel” is, and Jack himself died in 1982 (then 47, he succumbed to ALS).
The running order has been slightly changed for this CD reissue, and the original album’s three opening and most overtly Floridian numbers — “Florida Waltz”, “My Port Charlotte” and “Miami On My Mind” — are now spread a bit apart from each other. In addition, the one track that celebrated another state, “Red Level Alabama”, has been omitted, replaced by two single tracks, “Home In Fort Myers” and “Gonna Skateboard”.
The CD, as with the original vinyl, has absolutely no personnel info or credits of any kind. Word from the Butwell family is that a second CD will be released next year, with the omitted song and all of the other singles.