In the News
RECORDINGS
ROCKIN', SURFIN' & DANCIN' WITH MR. D
Saturday, March 13, 2004
Ottawa Citizen
By Norman Provencher
Tony D's Jook Joint 
Tony D (Independent)
Well, this could more properly be called "Tony D's Jukebox," one of those great old three-tunes-for-a-quarter kinds, probably from Down South where they're still known as "Seabirds," a confusion on the trade name Seeberg.
It's not quite a blues album, that is, not quite the concentrated rocking form that the Ottawa singer/guitarist has become known for. D's latest, lucky seventh record is all over the map, from old blues to new blues, from jazz (but in a good way) to psychedelia, and the debut of a form D likes to call "Argentinean surf-tango" (more on that later).
Still, underneath it all, like all good popular music, the fundamentals of the blues come through loud and clear, an almost religious adherence to beat and a commitment to feel over form.
There was a worrisome period for a while there when D was referring to the record as his "first studio record," as he worked on the album over the past few months in Ottawa's dandy Raven Street studio. And the studio probably deserves a share of the billing on the excellent, albeit unexpected cover of Jimi Hendrix's If 6 Was 9 (one of only two covers on the disc), with its vocals sounding like someone shouting down a sewer through a bullhorn. The guitar is all spacey over Sean Burke's throbbing bass and Matt Sobb's rock solid drums. But, as fun as the cut is, especially for listeners of a certain age, that's the only song where technology is manifest as part of the sound.
Instead, D and Raven street veteran Jason Jaknunas used all the buttons and dials to make a clean, punchy sound that builds the music up without drawing attention to the machines. Big Joe Williams' classic Baby Please Don't Go sounds fresh again, while D originals like Screaming and Crying, I Wanna Shout and Blues Party are three more examples of the fine tuneage Mr. Di Teodoro's been offering all these years.
But there were departures, such as the fluid, Wes Montgomery style jazz of Fat City Blues, with its scorching back-and-forth riffage between D and Ottawa's own saxmeister Zeek Gross.
And then there's what might be the album's tune-de-force, the catchy as the dickens Ass Tango, the aforementioned surf-tango number that swings like Los Straitjackets jamming with Django Reinhardt.
In a way, this could be an exploratory session for D, as he works out a bunch of styles and influences ringing around in his head and re-orients himself for another stage in his career.
But for the listener, Jook Joint is like one of those great radio shows you don't hear anymore, almost 50 minutes of coast-to-coast music, something for everyone and almost as cheap as a jukebox.
Tony D's Jook Joint will be released March 20 at The Rainbow Bistro.