Wednesday, February 23, 2005
The Best Albums You Never Heard
No, that's not a black and white photo.
Frozen stuff just looks like that.
A month or so ago, I was listening to Radio Margaritaville in the background while I toiled away doing Crime Dog stuff in my home office. At least it was in the background, until a particularly haunting ballad called "Hollow Man", sung with what I can only describe as a "storytelling voice," caught my attention. I dropped what I was doing and listened, deciding immediately that I had to own this album. Unfortunately, I got busy again when the song ended, and I never caught the title or artist name. But I didn't forget it. A song of that quality, I thought, I can find on the Internet. Wrong. I searched every way to Sunday, with no luck. But Kismet has a way of finding me sometimes. Last week, I was checking out the agenda for Phins To The West, and noted that one of the featured goups is The Boat Drunks. I jumped over to their site, and to my unabashed joy, found "Hollow Man" belongs to them!
I own a number of albums by artists little known outside Parrothead circles, and I enjoy them all. This one, however, is clearly the best of the lot. Other than three cuts listed as "used with permission," these are all originals. If you want Buffett covers, look elsewhere. "Hollow Man" is the best cut on the album, but I really couldn't find anything on it I didn't like. You may just want to adopt "A Pirate on the Caribbean" as your theme song, while the title cut takes you with a Cajun bounce to a Parrothead Bar somewhere in the frozen midwest, and you'll find a catchy Reggae feel to the hysterical "C Ya Manana." The instrumentals are high quality - I especially enjoyed Howie Golub's harmonica - and the production is very good quality, giving the CD a very clean, crisp sound.
The Crime Dog definitely recommends this one. You'll have to pick it up from The Boat Drunks themselves - I could find it nowhere else - and you'll likely to get it in a hand adressed package. Nothing like the personal touch, eh? I'm looking forward to seeing these guys at Phins, and you will too.
Next week: Freebo - The End of the Beginning
