Long Tall Deb & Colin John – Light It Up
10 Tracks – 40 minutes
Texas born “Long Tall Deb” Landolt got her start as many vocalists have by singing in her church. Her debut album with The Drifter Kings. Diamonds on the Desert Floor, was released in 2009. Her sophomore album, Raise Your Hands, was released in 2012 to much acclaim and radio exposure, particularly on Sirus/XM. She was joined on that album by Colin John on guitar. Colin was born in Cleveland but moved to Hawaii where he pursued his love of surfing and music. He toured with many blues artists including Little Mike and The Tornadoes, Henry Gray, Pinetop Perkins and Hubert Sumlin among many others. He also did a stint in The B.B. King Tribute band in Memphis. He released several solo albums beginning in 2003 before connecting with Long Tall Deb. The twosomes’ musical connection was immediately solidified with the release of a four song EP, Streets of Mumbai, in 2015, and their 2nd co-titled release, Dragon Fly, in 2018.
The collaboration continues with this release with Long Tall Deb on vocals and Colin playing guitar, six-string bass, lap steel, and baby sitar. Chris Butler co-produced the album and added bass, drums and percussion on several tracks with Jason Edwards also playing drums and adding percussion on some tracks.
The album consists of eight original songs and two covers beginning with the title song. Long Tall Deb advises “let’s take grief, let’s take hunger, let’s take fear, let’s take suspicion, let’s take misinformation, let’s light a spark and start a new kind of fire”. and questions “How can change really happen until we change how we feel?” Colin’s guitar punctuates every soulful declaration she makes. Zac Var guests on drums with a pounding beat on “My Love” as she explains “you got to give the love you want to receive” and Colin rocks out. “Lessons In the Ground” continues her concerns about social fears citing we are “waiting for a voice to turn this world around”.
The first cover is “Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)”, originally recorded by The Eurythmics (Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart) in 1983 in the song that proclaims “as you travel the world and the seven seas, some of us want to abuse you, some of us wants to be abused by you…everybody is looking for something”. The pop song shifts into a slightly heavier approach here. On “Hear Them Moan“, she explains “I was a young child raised on the Holy Ghost. I never questioned the faith. But as I got older, saw the black and white, that’s when the skies got a break…and as I broke from that old-time religion, that is when the steam started to rise”. The second cover is Howlin’ Wolf’s “Spoonful” with Steve Marriner guesting on harmonica with Deb kicking a bit of a growl into her vocals.
She turns back to her concerns about current social ills on “Deflection Blues” noting “Because he says it doesn’t make it true, deflection blues, create diversion…create distraction, we got a problem, it’s nothing new”. Colin pulls out his lap steel and sitar on the song. Deb Plays a Contra Bass Violin on “Black Light Wolf” and sings “There’s a most peculiar painting on the wall, a black light wolf, you can almost hear him howl. His eyes follow me all around the room”. “Sometimes I wonder if the Wolf were here, I wonder what he would do”. as she offers the whoo-hoo well known from Howin’ Wolf.
“Out For a Rip” features Alastair Greene and Pascal Fouquet on guitars in an instrumental showdown with Colin John. Deb questions if “We have had enough of these “Crooks, Thieves and Liars”? “They’ll burn the house down before it’s too late”. Colin again rolls his lap steel in a slow ballad.
The 1960’s saw numerous albums crying for change with anti- war messages and concerns about civil rights. The current sentiment calling for change again has been rising on numerous albums. This album delivers powerful lyrics giving rise to that theme. The cover songs feed to the overall social element of the originals noting “sweet dreams” and “everyone fighting for that spoonful”. Long Tall Deb has a very soulful voice, bordering on a gospel edge, perfectly suited for delivering her messages and Colin’s guitar floats through and rises in punctuation to her powerfully delivered concerns.
