Jimmy Carpenter – Just Got Started
12 Tracks – 55 Minutes
Jimmy Carpenter was born in Greensboro, North Carolina. He decided at an early age that he wanted to play the sax after listening to his father’s music collection of big band music which included Paul Desmond who played the alto sax with Dave Brubeck. Jimmy started playing in the school band from 5th grade onward. After graduation, Jimmy settled into playing with various regional bands. A friendship with Tinsley Ellis led a tour with Tinsley. Jimmy Thackeray then contacted Jimmy to become a member of his band, The Drivers, which lasted for six years.
In 2003, Carpenter left The Drivers and settled into New Orleans and quickly became part of their music scene. He became friends with Walter “Wolfman” Washington and joined Eric Lindell’s band among other gigs including a stint with Mike Zito and The Wheel in 2012. He also got involved in the running of the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage festival.
In 2015, Jimmy moved to Las Vegas where he is now the President of the Las Vegas Blues Society, the Talent Buyer and Musical Director of the Big Blues Bender, the annual Las Vegas blues festival, and the leader of the festival’s house band, The Bender Brass and for the annual Hart Party, which is a benefit for the Blues Foundation’s Handy Artist Relief Fund. To date the benefit has raised $440,000 for the Blues Foundation and they hope to surpass $500,000 with this year’s event.
In addition, he is a seven-time nominee and two-time winner of the Blues Foundation’s Blues Music Award for Best-Instrumentalist – Horns in 2021 and 2022 and a Grammy winner in 2021 for a song he contributed to an album, Atmosphere, by the New Orleans Nightcrawlers. He released his first solo album, Toiling in Obscurity, in 2008. His last previous album in 2022, The Louisiana Record, featured some of his favorite songs from that state.
This album is his sixth solo release and his third on Gulf Coast Records, Mike Zito’s label. Mike Zito is the Executive Producer for the album. Jimmy says his direction for the album is “blues-based, but also song oriented and funky cool with a kind of vintage soul vibe”. Recorded at Greaseland Studios with Christopher “Kid” Andersen producing, playing guitar on all tracks and adding organ on six. In addition to Jimmy on sax and doing lead vocals, he is joined by Jim Pugh on keyboards, Derrick D’mar Martin on drums and percussion, and Jerry Jemmott and Bobby Vega playing bass on the various tracks along with other guest performers.
“(Feels Like) I Just Got Started” opens the album. He describes the song as the last set of a night being a metaphor for his life in music as he “just got started and can’t stop now”. A cover of Willie Dixon’s “My Babe”, originally performed by Little Walter, follows. Mike Galisatus adds trumpet on the song. “I Only Gamble with My Heart” is his answer when people ask him if he is a gambler as he lives in Vegas. He smoothly says, “I never drew the winning cards, until I bet it all on you”. When I found “the queen of hearts, I went all in on you”.
Jimmy lets loose on his sax on the instrumental “Jimmy Shimmy” with Jim Pugh’s organ burning along and Bobby Vega switching to a guitar run. He then slows things down with a cover of The Manhattans’ “Shining Star” with his statement that “I want to be right here with you until my dying day”. A funky cover of Allen Toussaint’s “Night People” gets things jumping again.
On “Live Again”, he asks her “to just have the strength to hold me and help me heal again” in another romantic soul song. He describes “King” Curtis Ousley as his saxophone hero. The instrumental “Soul Theme ” is the first of two covers on the album from King Curtis and he certainly gets the funk tearing up the sound. “Keep on Stepping” keeps the funk going as he declares” there ain’t no time to sleep, get your feet out there on the street”.
A cover of Otis Rush’s “Working Man”, which was written by Mike Bloomfield and Nick Gravenites, tells the story of the man who works all the time but particularly “in the nighttime, just to keep my baby cool. A cover of Delbert McClinton’s “Leap of Faith”, written by Glen Clark and Gary Nicholson” is next with Lisa Andersen joining on backing vocals. He concludes the album with the second King Curtis cover, “Midnight Blue”, a low, sexy instrumentals.
Jimmy’s inviting vocals and sax work would be a very successful background to a romantic dinner with your significant other or date, a bottle of wine on the table and perhaps some candles with the music offering intervals of quiet sharing over the table and encouragement of a dance along the way. Or just turn up the volume and let the party start.
