Taking the Long Way Home: Jim Lauderdale’s London Southern

Full of restless energy, Jim Lauderdale roams peripatetically through musical landscapes. In the past three years, he moved through country on I’m a Song, soul on Soul Searching: vol. 1, Nashville; vol.2, Memphis, bluegrass on Lost in the Lonesome Pines—an album he made with Ralph Stanley and the Clinch Mountain Boys—and folk and roots on the pair of albums he wrote with Robert Hunter, Black Roses and Blue Moon Junction. Now, on his 29th album, London Southern, Lauderdale turns east, delivering an album full of songs—collaborating with Dan Penn, Odie Blackmon, John Oates, and Kendell Marvel—that capture the sound of early ’60s American soul music as it runs through the British musical landscape and then as that music is reinvented on American musical terrain.

Lauderdale wrote these songs while he was on tour in England and Scotland. Nick Lowe’s producer/sound tech/guitar tech Neil Brockbank and Robert Treherne, drummer for Lowe and Van Morrison, produced the album in two sessions at Gold Top Studios in London. Bobby Irwin joined Brockbank for the first session, but he died before the album saw the light of day, and the album is dedicated to him. Lowe’s touring band—Treherne on drums; Matt Radford on bass; Steve Donnelly on guitar, and Geraint Watkins on keyboards—backs Lauderdale on the album.

London Southern opens with a bright little country dance hall number, “Sweet Time,” whose musical notes shuffle along in a manner that perversely cloaks the impatience of the singer. He’s willing to wait on his lover—“they say that love’s patient and kind”—but his wry vocals tell another story when he utters, “but you’re taking your sweet time.” “I Love You More” is a smoky cabaret song that could come straight off a late Van Morrison album like Avalon Sunset. “We’ve Only Got So Much Time Here,” co-written with Blackmon, opens with a riff reminiscent of Derek and the Dominoes’ version of Atlanta soul singer Chuck Willis’ “It’s Too Late,” and carries on with the same bluesy R&B reflection, quite perfect for a mournful song on the nature of time: “we’ve only got so much time/and I hope I’m not too late.” The bridge features a guitar riff straight out of “Time Is on Our Side.”  “I Can’t Do without You,” co-written with Marvel, is a funked up “This Boy,” with riffs and vocal shouts from “I’m Not Your Stepping Stone.” The horns that open “You Came to Get Me” propel this vibrant soul song that’s straight out of Stax. “No Right Way to Be Wrong” takes its musical structure from Chuck Berry’s “Memphis” via The Stones, while “Don’t Shut Me Down,” written with Penn, emanates from those famous Shoals in Alabama.

The songs on London Southern find Lauderdale covering familiar terrain: love found and lost, the sweetness of a just-right love, and hope for enough time to embrace the journeys we travel in life. A new album from Lauderdale is always a treat since we get to listen to him explore different musical styles and stretch out on lyrics that reveal his restless and creative genius.

Track List:

1.    Sweet Time (Lauderdale)
2.     I Love You More (Lauderdale)
3.     We’ve Only Got So Much Time Here (Lauderdale, Blackmon)
4.     You Came to Get Me (Lauderdale)
5.     What Have You Got to Lose (Lauderdale, Penn)
6.     If I Can’t Resist (Lauderdale, Oates)
7.     Don’t Let Yourself Get in The Way (Lauderdale)
8.     No Right Way to Be Wrong (Lauderdale)
9.     Different Kind of Groove Some Time (Lauderdale, Oates)
10.  I Can’t Do Without You (Lauderdale, Marvel)
11.  Don’t Shut Me Down (Lauderdale, Penn)
12.  This Is a Door (Lauderdale)