Anybody else out there feel like Dr. John is New Orleans’ bluesier version of Captain Beefheart? I bought his “Babylon” album just today, and the resemblance is striking at times. Those grunts, that weirdo orchestration… what a great album though!
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Meta
Is’t his music close to Funkadelic? (Judging from the one song I could listen: Food for Thot)
When I saw CB with the tragic band in 1974,
Dr John was in the audience…
didn’t he try out as pianist for the mothers around the freak out period?
Doctor John’s “Gris Gris” is one of my secret stash albums. When Voodoo priests make LSD and it falls into the hands of a musician, and the musician is survives the experience, only then can he make a record like “Gris Gris”. But only once.
Children who see the album cover are haunted for life.
Don’t listen to this album unless you’re so high that you’ve got the fear.
There are similarities – the blues influence particularly – but Beefheart is in a separate reality of his own both lyrically and musically. For example, the use of dissonance and conflicting time signatures whereas Dr John tends to keep it tight and funky. And I can’t quite visualise Beefheart making an album of Duke Ellington covers…
http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00002MFC1/qid=1128933985/sr=1-9/ref=sr_1_11_9/202-0293884-3421407
Gris Gris = fabulous. Much more accessible than Beefheart.
The version of “I Walk on Guilded Splinters†on the “Rockin’ the Fillmore†album of Humble Pie (20 min long) is one of my favourites.
By the way, I’m not surprised that Gris Gris is also one of the favourite albums of Arno.
Dr Sharl, ever the helpful person, went to the library just now and got some more Dr. John. I haven’t heard much of his recordings so far, but what I have heard is excellent. On the player right now:
– Anutha Zone
– Creole Moon
– City Lights
Unfortunately the apparently excellent “Gris Gris” album is not available at the library at the moment.
@xorg: Duke Elegant was my introduction to Dr. John, and what a wonderful album it is…
I saw Dr John during his ‘Gris Gris’ phase, in 1970. This was at the Bath Festival in Shepton Mallet and guess who else was on the bill (amongst others)? None other than The Mothers of Invention (Flo & eddie version).