Chris Smither Paul Cebar

Chris Smither w/ Paul Cebar
Some artists continually reinvent themselves; others identify their muse early on and spend their careers single-mindedly pursuing it, remaining recognizably themselves through a career-long process of refinement, growth and discovery. Chris Smither belongs to the latter group. Leave the Light On, Smither's masterful twelfth album - the first he's released on his own Mighty Albert label - stands as the quintessence of his life's work while throwing in some new wrinkles that reflect where he's been and what he's encountered since the last time around. But Smither's central theme as he enters his 60s is clearer than ever. What is immediately recognizable to anyone who has encountered Smither on record or in live performance during the course of the last four decades are his been-there, done-that voice and the crystalline, wordlessly eloquent sounds of his fingerpicked acoustic guitar. Familiar, too, are the writer/artists whose songs Smither has selected to intermingle with his own. These include Lightnin' Hopkins, whose "Blues in the Bottle" - a striking showcase for Smither's approach to the acoustic guitar - is drawn from Blues in My Bottle, the album that inspired the New Orleans-born, Boston-based artist to begin performing in the 1960s; and his contemporary Bob Dylan, from whose vast oeuvre the artist this time has chosen the Blonde on Blonde linchpin "Visions of JohannaWhen asked about his career-long predilection for mixing in outside songs with his own material, Smither says, "This may sound a little self-important, maybe, but I like to hold these things up and say, 'These are the people I consider my peers, and my stuff stands up to this. This is what I do, and this is where I come from.'" The four non-originals on Leave the Light On - also including Peter Case's "Cold Trail Blues" - indicate where Chris Smither comes from; the eight new songs he's fashioned show where this deeply soulful artist is now, and what lies ahead. The particular opening into the universal, delivered by a knowing voice and filigreed by tasty licks - you can't ask for more than that from an album.
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TOMMOROW Sound Now For Yes Music People, the newest addition to the Paul Cebar catalog, boasts both the open-hearted spontaneous soulful- ness we've come to expect from this dedicated musician (Who Can Love Who?, The Same Dog, Marv's Fluttering Guitar, I'm Qualified) and wild- headed, crazyquilt conjuring (Knock It To Me, Like A Gentleman Oughta, Spread That Sugar) that feels like a bold contemporary invigoration of the inviting verities he has always explored. There's the meaty Hey Hey Honey, a delightful a capella nod to Alan Lomax and his recording of Norfolk's Bright Lights Quartet, a tender tribute to Sierra Leone's King of Palmwine Music, S.E. Rogie in his Do Me Justice, and Paul's glorious homage to guitarist Marv Tarplin, Smokey Robinson's right hand man for the last 40 years, Marv's Flut- tering Guitar. Add the classic New Orleans swagger of I Got Trouble (replete with Cebar's Jessie Hill-inspired tambourine machinations) and the storming plea for tenderness The Gimp Sparrow (richly reflecting the influence of Paul's travels in Cuba, Brazil and Trinidad), and it's clear that this is a romp of colossal heart and scope. The years since the release of the last studio album have been spent touring continu- ally and intensifying the fervor with which Cebar has always infused his music. From the Hot Chocolate meets Latin Playboys skank of How'd You Get Like That? to the stately Muscle Shoals balladry of I'm Qualified, featuring Nick Lowe's brotherly back-up vocals, Tommorow Sound Now For Yes Music People is the best batch yet of of an endangered strain of fortified, intensi- fied, fully jacked-up, roaring and exceedingly personal music-making from a singular Midwestern master. It may be time for all sorts of things, but it is high time for Paul Cebar. He has been, is, and will be the real doggone deal.