13 Energetic Live Tracks & Rock Lives With Hard Working Americans
John Apice
Posted On October 11, 2017
Let’s just say for the moment that all you want this winter is one hot unadulterated rock and roll record. Start here:
This collection is quite an undertaking. From the outset of the opening live number “Mission Accomplished” – which should have been the closing song since this is exactly what this band of diversified musicians did. They accomplished something.
Todd Snider leads this group of “hard-working Americans” through 13-energetic tracks. Singer-songwriter Neal Casal (from Denville, NJ – Bergen County – my hunting ground & former guitarist with Ricky Medlocke’s Blackfoot – a great southern rock outfit), drummer Duane Trucks (Widespread Panic – and a member of the Trucks’ musical family) and several other accomplished instrumentalists weave their way through a web of rocking songs that prove that hardboiled rock still lives in the heartland and it’s safely in the hands of people who understand it down to its roots.
“We’re All in This Together” is more of an ambitious endeavor than just some record a bunch of musicians decided to team up to do. The band itself is known as Hard Working Americans (since 2013): The entire album sounds like it was studio created yet, it’s a live set.
Tight as the smallest pebble under a huge mountain. Deep as the first spark in an active volcano, sweaty and efficient as the powerhouse known as the American laborer. The skilled worker comes in many colors, religions and, heritages and they celebrated here with vigor. No politics here…oh no. Just patriotic stamina for those who love the ground they stand on and walk upon — here and now.
The album seethes – it’s so full of relentless energy it’s like how two meatballs pop out of the ass of a meatball sandwich when you bite into it. This album needs to be held onto tight and every bite – like the American dream — savored.
So, getting back to the music: the military type drum opening to “Mission Accomplished” along with the traditional Bo Diddley guitar lick tugs at your ear gently. Snider’s crisp vocals rock proficiently. The twin guitars of Neal Casal and Jesse Aycock chime with authority. Dave Schools (Widespread Panic) provides a solid foundation as Duane Trucks lays down a precise steady beat. Chad Staehly on keyboards is one of many lending the dynamics of background vocals. But this rock has a nice grungy lower-register edge to it and instruments just toss layer upon layer of notes that are there but hardly noticeable. This is a team effort…cool and calculated.
At times it sounds like it’s a borderline jam session but it’s too well rehearsed to be something tossed off the cuff. And this is not a bad thing. This track has a wonderfully relaxed lead guitar solo that bristles. And you can hear the two guitars intertwine into knots like shoelaces in the back of the sock drawer. This is The Grateful Dead with discipline. It’s the opening number and you can feel the positive good vibrations in the performance from the beginning.
Seamlessly, the second track starts with an intro that leads you into their nest of melody. “I Don’t Have a Gun,” is a nine-minute workout and if you’re going to play for that length of time you’d better have something to say. This crew has plenty. The track was written by Will Kimbrough and Tommy Womack. It has blends of blues but is totally in a tight rock and roll vice. Unlike many standard rock songs, this is arranged. You can hear the changes, the fast clips, slowdowns, and sexy lyrical inflections. Trucks is still in a very heavy-handed but concise steady beat mode. The lead guitar winds and it’s a well-constructed melodic run. The band itself is now in Lynyrd Skynyrd – early Allman Brothers territory. The audience of “hippies” sing along at one point and it’s a nice supporting act. Snider addresses them as hippies and it’s hilarious and hip. This was a well-recorded performance, patriotic and powerful. Had this been released in the 1960’s it would have easily become an anthem and played widely on rock FM stations. Much the same as Steppenwolf’s classic “Monster.”
A great Jerry Lee Lewis type-piano and fiery harmonica ignite the third track Hayes Carll’s “Stomp and Holler” into a rallying call. Bruce Springsteen and John Mellancamp would be proud — but on this day, they have nothing on Todd Snider and his army of musicians. Very enjoyable recording.
Track four starts with a nice guitar intro and Snider’s vocal is laid back and slow on “Roman Candles” — an original which also features some haunting female backup. This is a grittier blues ballad and Duane Trucks’ snare is crisp as the chiming guitars turn like slow gears in an old pickup truck. At times Chad’s keyboards resemble an old calliope sound in a very Beatlesque manner. The lead guitar solo smolders in tone and is perfect for this type of showcase. “Something Else,” – another band original has an excellent lead guitar riff: dark but infectious. It snarls, has the necessary ingredients to be memorable too. Snider’s vocals are polished but they never lose the grittiness required to be sincere. How I would have loved to have heard an Elvis Presley sing a song like this.
Trucks’ drums are battering rams and the effects of all the instruments are like carefully plotted scenes in a motion picture. Every frame is a still shot. This track is over eight minutes long as well and its strong like the long songs of an earlier rock era. The interest quotient is high because these musicians know how to hold attention. There’s never a dull moment. The lead guitar at the six-minute mark is classic 60’s lead in the style of Iron Butterfly even – a band that had moments of brilliance on guitar but have been somewhat forgotten. It also has that approach made famous by Gun – a band with incredible Adrian (Lead Guitar) and bassist Paul Curtis (Gurvitz) performance. Never heard of them? They played with Ginger Baker and Buddy Miles at one time in the Three-Man Army, Baker-Gurvitz Army, Graham Edge Band and other bands.
Track six opens with a little influence of Leon Russell vocal style on “Ascending into Madness.” The Snider original is poignant and his pronunciation of the words in the song are hauntingly Russell. A good rocker and jam can be found on “Another Train.” Snarling guitars and slinky Snider vocals. For some reason, the best rock songs always have that indecipherable quality to the lyrics that makes it appealing. If you sing the lyric too clean it lacks that rock certifiability.
The tune has a wall of sound drive and lead guitar teases sprinkled liberally throughout the melody. There’s something magic about a wall of sound rhythm section built around an aggressive lead guitar (in grandiose doses here) with just the right tone that drips from the mouth of the guitar. This song is also like The Grateful Dead-Butterfield Blues Band in its incendiary jam attack. Quite exciting. Even more exciting for the audience that is there and can see it happen in real time.
I have to admit this CD has 13-tracks and in my preliminary listening prior to writing and critiquing this album had a solid 13 out of 13 song approval. Doesn’t happen often. There wasn’t a single song that didn’t have a redeeming value to the whole of the performance.
Track 9 opens with a Snider dialogue on “…blowin’ in the wind.” And it’s a hoot. Great audience reaction to the introduction of all the musicians in the rebelliously-fueled band. “We’re All in This Together” / “Is This Thing Working” is an entertaining intro. Years ago Time Magazine had a writer who said: “I have seen the future of rock and roll and it’s Bruce Springsteen.”
In 2017, I say “I have heard the future of rock music and Todd Snider is a charter member with Hard Working Americans.”
Snider’s vocal is similar on this track in delivery to so many classic vocalists from Southside Johnny, Duke and the Drivers, The Dictators, The BoDeans, The Rockets, J.Geils Band, Ronnie Hawkins and that whole music world on the fringe of commercial rock. Sometimes all a song really needs is a clever narration and this song has that in spades. “Is this thing working…is this thing on…” Repetition on a great hook at its finest. As far as a workable attractive live smokin’ track this one is a locomotive. On any given day a band like this can take any superstar band to the mat or at least keep it on the ropes. Bravo.
After wiping some sweat from my brow after that last song Snider slows the action down and starts Guy Clark’s “The High Price of Inspiration” in an entirely different vocal style. Here, his contemporaries would be these great independent artists Greg Fleming and Bow Thayer and the likes of other artists similar to them who work this seam in rock music. They are all proficient. This song has a steady low thud beat known primarily by groups like the Fairfield Four and it’s cloaked in the chime of Neal Casal’s and Jesse Aycock’s pensive guitars. This endeavor has had a long journey to fruition and the inner CD sleeve has its history (some of you may need reading glasses).
“Run a Mile,” — track 12 — this one has gnarling crunchy guitars and Snider sings with the energy and conviction of a Levon Helm. It’s a song with Steve Earle crossed with Tony Joe White and J.J. Cale. It has swamp guitars a-plenty and Snider’s finest vocal. You can almost smell the Delta in this song, the Spanish moss, the wet leaves, the bloodhounds, moonshine and alligators at the back door. The finale is a gnarl of lead guitars, lap steel, and voodoo grind. This is a humid song…listen with an icy lemonade close by.
The closing tune is a classic cover of Chuck Berry’s “School Days,” and it’s virtually reanimated into an Americana-rocker. Jesse’s lap steel cries over the melody and the standard rock drums of Duane Trucks — impeccable. How you can’t clap your hands and stamp your feet when a song like this comes on the speakers is beyond me. A grand closer with another swipe at a Jerry Lee Lewis piano takes off courtesy of the hot fingers of Chad Staehly. This is a well-constructed cover and I say again, for a live concert, very well-recorded. Add this 1 hour twenty-minute CD to you’re A-pile and the winter will pass a lot quicker.
The album was produced by Dave Schools (Bassist) and George Boedecker. Recorded live at various venues. The album was also dedicated the late Col. Bruce Hampton (a great performer & musician).
The CD art is a 4-panel with a nice 12-page stitched insert. There’s a full-color image of the crowds of hard-working Americans (probably at the concert) and the inner artwork is the band on stage facing their audience. The back cover of Snider on a bike (photo by Neal Casal).
Todd Snider has a birthday October 11th – Happy Birthday.
Website: https://www.thehardworkingamericans.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HardWorkingAmericans
Music Samples: https://www.reverbnation.com/hardworkingamericans/songs
Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this review/commentary are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official position of No Depression. All photography is owned by the respective photographers and is their copyrighted image; credited where photographer’s name was known & being used here solely as a reference and will be removed on request. YouTube images are standard YouTube license.
John Apice / No Depression / October 2017
