Blaze Foley is one of those eternally dropped names, usually by the hip or the famous (often both) musicians with tales to tell of the late and largely unheralded Texas troubadour and roustabout. Here is a veritable bushfire of fans, friends, acolytes and disciples, all keen to peddle his music to a wider public. If you have heard the name, now’s the opportunity to put his mouth into those of others, ahead, maybe, of risking the real thing.
Michael David Fuller, as he was born, in December, 1949, grew up in a musical family, singing gospel, as part of The Singing Fuller Family, with his mother, brother, and sisters. Childhood polio left him with a limp, and the sort of chip on his shoulder that predisposed toward the same sort of vices that beset his friend and co-conspirator, Townes Van Zandt. Although it was clear to see his songs were strong and sound, he was often his own worst enemy in his self-promotion thereof. A, let’s say, colorful career was demarcated more by setbacks and disappointment, with wider fame always one step ahead of him. His premature death, at 39, shot dead under never quite fully agreed circumstances, left him more as a memory than his meagre lifetime of recordings could ever provide. Sittin’ With Blaze isn’t the first tribute set to his dedication, but is certainly of higher profile.
“If Only I Could Fly” is probably his best-known song, courtesy covers by the likes of the Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard duo version, together with others by Nanci Griffith and Kimmie Rhodes. It is the opener, here, in a steel and strings drenched iteration by Phosphorescent, aka Matthew Houck. Quite unlike other versions, not least Foley’s own gruff delivery, Houck sweetens and softens the song into a languid lullaby. Houck’s voice is all liquid yearning and he makes the wish, no, need to fly resonate with the regret of then realised gravity, dashing any such hope to despair.
Truer to the original is Willie Weeks’ “Big Cheeseburger and Good French Fries.” With a title like that, you might expect some John Prine style whimsy, but no, this is an amiable low-key ragtime shuffle, allowing the lyric to state the simple pleasure of this life on the road staple, or the search for it. Lucy Dacus follows this, her “Clay Pigeons” is carried mainly, over fingerpicked guitar, by her cooing hum of a voice, emphasizing the delicate beauty of the song. And, if “Sittin’ by the Road,” up next, threatens to be more of the same, the performer, Cactus Lee, inserts clarinet and his light voice into it, it becoming a loose look at me swagger of vintage charm. Known also by his given name, Kevin Dehan, he is the first new to me here, name duly noted.
“Slow Boat To China” sounds familiar, it taking a mere moment to clock some similarity with a back porch acoustic “Honky Tonk Women,” somehow avoiding the hokum of “Country Honk.” This is surely in part down to the singer, Dylan Earl. It also seems to feed on the energy of the song preceding, pulling the whole project up through the gears and into cruise control, abetted by some dirty blues guitar as it feeds out. Like Dehan, Earl is another on the dustbowl circuit of taverns and roadhouses across the southern states, each following the footsteps of Foley, sidestepping the mainstream at every opportunity.
From cruise control, it is foot to the floor that is now offered by Uncle Lucius, Kevin Galloway’s Austin veterans, for a full pelt “Election Day.” Splendidly loose yet tight, tight yet loose, the band hurtle through the song in full band mode, with a welter of searing guitar solos, all blistering twang, enough to satisfy any barroom brawler. It is pretty awesome, bolstered with a tremendously louche bass line.
Follow that? Well, the only way is not to, but to produce something completely different from out the hat, which is what Riley Downing then delivers in spades. Drawing up every iota of Foley’s ingrained gospel roots, it is “Let Me Ride in Your Big Cadillac.” If you question any link between gospel and Cadillacs, you clearly are unfamiliar with Galilene dealerships, Cadillacs being the choice, we seem to learn, of the Lord Jesus. With a tremendous four part harmony vocal backdrop, the song is as joyful as it is unexpected. Downing sings it like a dream. More to the point, by now the penny has dropped that, footnote in musical history or not, Foley was a well skilled and well-schooled craftsman of his art.
The current darling of alt-country, or should that be alt-alt-country, is Joshua Ray Walker. Given “Cold Cold World,” one of Foley’s more maudlin pieces, he imparts it the full Doc Watson, chocka with homespun purity, just guitar and voice, the contrast enough to make it an album highlight. Thence to Twain, another name new to me, the handle of onetime Low Anthem-eer, Mat Davidson, who pours his sweet molasses of a voice over “The Way That You Smile,” it becoming a shining gem, glimpsed through a dusty stagecoach window. The quality is really being maintained, and to a very high standard.
A further new name, that of Angela Autumn, a native Appalachian, disappoints neither, her voice typical of the area, the sound of a mountain stream, if strewn with sufficient boulders as to make for character, causing the flow to break and swerve. “Rainbows and Ridges” is on of Foley’s simpler constructions, Autumn realizing the strength of less is more, avoiding any temptation to over embellish.
Likewise for “Fat Boy,” a song of acerbic self-deprecation, rather than adding sung venom to the already damning wordplay, John R. Miller applies a matter-of-factness that underlines the narrative, and that is altogether much more effective. The pain is there, but you have to listen to catch it. Two bigger names follow, John Moreland and Lydia Loveless, in duet mode. Their rendition of “Failed Loves and Memories” is consummate, channeling the mood of John Prine and Iris Dement, in a song every bit as good as either of those two could write.
“Where’s Lucinda” is something often said with tribute albums like this, she being such a staunch presence on such discs. Given she and Foley were road buddies, she writing her song “Drunken Angel” about the late singer, you would expect her to be a cert here. Which, of course, indeed she is, bringing up the rear. Rather than anything different, it is a further version of the opener, “If Only I Could Fly” that she closes the set with. Once more, it could not be more different, shining yet more light on the nooks and crannies of the song. I cannot remember her voice sounding this mellow for years, having a hint almost more of Mary Gauthier about the timbre. It is a wonderful version of the song and the perfect tailgate for this expertly curated and produced record.
If the roles of a tribute record are many, beyond just a holler for the artist being so honored, this satisfies on so many levels. The fact that I went straight to Foley’s Bandcamp presence, purchasing a couple of discs there and then, says one thing, but I now also have a set of names, those lesser known names featured here, who have moved from who they to ones to watch. Sittin’ With Blaze is, simply and succinctly, a damn fine listen.
Sittin’ With Blaze tracklisting:
01. Phosphorescent – If I Could Only Fly
02. Willie Watson – Big Cheeseburgers & Good French Fries
03. Lucy Dacus – Clay Pigeons
04. Cactus Lee – Sittin’ By the Road
05. Dylan Earl – Slow Boat to China
06. Uncle Lucius – Election Day
07. Riley Downing – Let Me Ride in Your Big Cadillac
08. Joshua Ray Walker – Cold, Cold World
09. Twain – The Way You Smile
10. Angela Autumn – Rainbows & Ridges
11. John R. Miller – Fat Boy
12. John Moreland w/ Lydia Loveless – Faded Love and Memories
13. Lucinda Williams – If I Could Only Fly
