Rod MacDonald Recognition CD

The nearly 73 minutes and 17 tracks on Recognition (including a hidden track of the shaggy dog baseball story "Mojo & the St. Luke's Flukes," set to the tune of "St. James Infirmary") allow Rod MacDonald the space to offer a full complement of typically witty and heartfelt considerations of political and emotional matters. On a personal level, he who in the past wrote so many songs of romantic excursion, continues to celebrate his happy marriage on such songs as "You Who Sleep Beside Me" and "We Got It Good & That Ain't Bad." But if MacDonald enjoys domestic bliss, he continues to be stirred up by what he reads in the paper and what he sees around him, and much of the album is given over to songs with social and political implications. On "The Man Who Dropped the Bomb on Hiroshima," he confronts that pilot and hears his justifications and doubts; on "My Neighbors in Delray," he considers the September 11 terrorists who lived near him while attending flight school; "Doctor Gachet" concerns a Van Gogh painting that went unsold at first, but is now passed between millionaires, unseen by the public; "Video Game" takes on virtual violence; and "137 Executions (Not One Innocent Man)" disparages the death-penalty policies of Texas and a certain former governor of that state who went on to higher office. MacDonald reserves his broadest political statement for the end of the disc with "For the Good of America," which looks back across 40 years and the many governmental deceptions dating back to the assassination of President Kennedy. The rigorousness of MacDonald's arguments is augmented by the forcefulness of his clear tenor and the familiar folk and folk-rock arrangements that may cause the listener to sing along whether or not he or she shares MacDonald's political philosophy. ~ William Ruhlmann

Produced by Mark Dann & Rod MacDonald with assistance and arrangements by Steve Eriksson.Recorded at Mark Dann Studio, New York, NY, except “My Neighbors In Delray” recorded at Acoustic Music Productions by Ron Litchauer, West Palm Beach, FL.Mixed by Mark Dann, Rod MacDonald and Glenn Erwin.Mastered by Sean M. Mormelo.Musicians and vocalists:Rod MacDonald--acoustic guitar, harmonica and lead vocalsMark Dann--bass and harmony vocals ( “For The Good Of America”) Steve Holly--drumsSteve Eriksson--acoustic and electric guitars, harmony vocals Bernie Shanahan--piano, keyboards, and harmony vocals Craig Harris--percussionFrancis Rovelli--harmony vocals Susan McKeown--harmony vocals "MacDonald's Recognition (Wind River Records) describes the ongoing battle between people's impulses, their desire for truthful, individual contact with others and their tendency to shun it for the comforts of mass culture and groupthink. The narrator of the galloping Mickey World sits alone watching television after work, 'thinking the song, the band, the movie and the news are all the same company.' The more direct, unmediated experience of love -- captured in the delicate opener, You Who Sleep Beside Me, and the atypically hard-rocking Dance by Lightning -- is often the only rescue for MacDonald's characters." ....Sun-Sentinel, Ft Lauderdale, FL 7/4/03....."Recognition is a fitting title as, following my recent comment in the reissue review of MacDonald's 1983 debut No Commercial Traffic, the man thoroughly deserves each and every plaudit he receives....This is Macdonald's third Florida album, or at least, the third that he has released since his mid nineteen-nineties relocation to the Sunshine State from New York City,by way of Pontiac, Michigan.....Across seventeen songs MacDonald paints a multi-faceted landscape of life in his homeland, circa the early 21st century AD, clearly making Recognition one of his finest works to date. " Arthur Wood, Folkwax

Principally recorded at Mark Dann Studios, New York, New York.

Personnel: Rod MacDonald (vocals, acoustic guitar, harmonica); Steve Erickson (acoustic guitar, electric guitar); Bernie Shanahan (piano, keyboDirty Linen (p.56) - "[H]e balances tension with a heartfelt love song, an optimistic folk-rocker, and a rib-tickling baseball ballad..."