Allan reviewed Sam Baker’s album “Horses and Stars” this summer. It took him a few listens, but when he got it, he really did get it. Sam’s songs are powerful stories of the everyday triumphs and tragedies of ordinary Americans, ‘the single mothers, the alcoholics, the drug addicts, the widows and the guilt-ridden’, the people getting on with their lives whatever challenges are thrown in their direction. These are the real stories of contemporary America. So we were obviously pleased when Sam agreed to make a contribution to the 2019 High Fives feature with the music that he listens to while he paints (and some references to the background of these pieces). As a bonus, we also have an example of Sam’s artwork.
Miles Davis
Sketches of Spain (with Gil Evans)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sketches_of_Spain
Miles Davis
Kind of Blue
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kind_of_Blue
John Coltrane
The Gentle Side of John Coltrane
Bill Evans
Sunday At the Village Vanguard
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunday_at_the_Village_Vanguard
Sam Cooke
Anything he sings especially with the Soul Stirrers
And some of Sam’s artwork to go with the list….
I guess this is one that was inevitable; a live album that was recorded almost by accident, just because they could, and what an interesting piece of work it is. Unusually, this didn’t grab the attention at the first listen and it wasn’t a grower. On about the fourth listen, the power of the lyrics suddenly hit home and everything started to fit together. Sam Baker’s songs are self-contained stories, told with perfect economy; there isn’t a superfluous word as he tells us about the kind of people we’re all surrounded by, whether we know it or not; the single mothers, the alcoholics, the drug addicts, the widows and the guilt-ridden all doing their best to make it through another day. It’s the life of a small Texas town told in twelve small but perfectly-formed chapters.
The delivery as a live performance matches up perfectly with the stark subject matter. Sam Baker relates the tales in a sung-spoken style that has hints of Tom Waits and an interesting minimalist picked electric guitar style (more about that later), plus a wooden block to tap out the tempo with a foot. It works perfectly because the stark arrangement focusses all the attention on the power of Sam’s writing and the stories of despair and injustice but, ultimately, hope.
Back to that thing about the guitar style. After surviving a terrorist bombing of a train in Peru, which nearly ended his life, Sam’s long and painful recovery eventually led to using his music as a therapy, which included learning to play an upside-down guitar to adjust to the loss of a large part of his left hand. The playing style he’s developed strips all of the arrangements back to basics, shining a spotlight on the beating, bleeding heart of each of the songs.
Highlights? “Mennonite” is a poignant story of an unlikely relationship and forms the centrepiece of the album, “Boxes” is a heart-rending tale of a Vietnam widow and “Odessa” deals with the tragic fallout from a spoilt, entitled upbringing. Seriously though, it’s all good and you get the chance to hear it live in the UK early next year.
“Horses and Stars” is released in the UK on Friday August 23rd.
