"Well most certainly no one will ever
accuse it of being a sell out record."
From the moody opening chords of "Contemplation" to the album's last song, the off-beat, sax crazed "My Time", Lou Ann Bardash's debut CD, At The Vortex, takes us on a melancholy blue journey mixing rock, blues, folk and jazz influences. Armed with a pensive, dark alto, she sings her songs in the natural voice of a woman sobered by experience and reality while remaining miraculously unaffected by fashion or the forces of the marketplace. "I've always been a tone freak," she said in a recent interview. "I love to listen to singers that have something different in the tone of their voice. Every since I can remember, people have told me that I didn't sound like anyone else..."
Of
the twelve tracks on the album, eight are originals. With the use of dissonant
chords and often odd meter structures, the songs showcase her unique individual writing
style. The subjects of the songs range from those of an intensely personal nature, such as
the above mentioned "Contemplation", "People Come", and
"Never Say It Again", to songs which could be called mini-bios, such as
"Oklahoma, 1912". "That song is my version of Woody Guthrie's story. I read
a biography of him and listened to a bunch of his music. But I think the song really
started in my mind when I heard a recording of Alan Lomax interviewing Woody and it
brought it all alive for me..." With drummer Ken Coomer banging on a wash-tub to
great effect, the song covers Woody Guthrie in his growing years and the tragic effects
that Huntington's disease had on his family.
Another song, "Sophie Frankenstein", was inspired by an obituary from an
old copy of a small town Illinois newspaper that Lou Ann had come across. The song tells
the story of Sophie Frankenstein, a retired school teacher who has passed away. Lou Ann
handles percussion and, once again, Mr. Coomer offers a spectacular counter rhythm while
Larry Chaney adds an eerie Twin Peaks-like guitar. The song's ghostly melody haunts long
after the music stops.
Of the four cover songs on the album, Lou Ann reworks the Leonard Cohen gem "Tower Of Song" from a 4/4 rhythm to an edgy 3/4 bluesy shuffle, remakes Bessie Smith's "Sorrowful Blues" into her own country/blues style, does a tender, beautiful rendition of the Tom Ovans masterpiece of rebellion and rebirth "Gone To Mexico", and turns in a stunning interpretation of the Art Hodes Trio's classic "Booze and Blues", revamping it into a late night torch song with only R&B/jazz artist Dennis Taylor accompanying her on tenor sax.
At The Vortex may be Lou Ann Bardash's debut CD, but it's more like catching a glimpse of an artist in mid-flight, already aware of where she's been and determined to get where she's going.
"I'm constantly searching. Both my music and my painting, my art, so to say, are results of that search. Searching for ways to never waste time. Not by cramming in a lot of activities or that type of thing, but by living as if each day could be the last. Some think of that as morbid, but I think of it as appreciation. But then again, maybe I think too much."
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