Widespread Panic Night Of Joy CD

/Dirty Dozen Brass Band.
Widespread Panic: John Bell (vocals); George McConnell (guitar, background vocals); John Hermann (keyboards, background vocals); Dave Schools (bass); Todd Nance (drums); Domingo S. Ortiz (percussion).
Additional personnel: Dirty Dozen Brass Band.
Recorded live at House Of Blues, Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.
Personnel: John Bell , George McConnell (vocals, guitar); John Hermann (vocals, keyboards); Jamie McLean (guitar); Roger Lewis (soprano saxophone, baritone saxophone); Kevin Bruce Harris (tenor saxophone); Efrem Towns (trumpet, flugelhorn); Revert Andrews (trombone); Julius McKee (sousaphone); Terence Higgins (drums, percussion); Todd Nance (drums); Domingo Ortiz (percussion).
Audio Mixer: John Keane.
Recording information: House Of Blues, Myrtle Beach, SC.
Photographers: Tom L. Smith; Flournoy Holmes.
Recorded live at the House of Blues in South Carolina, this Widespread Panic date featured the addition of the Dirty Dozen Brass Band playing alongside them. It makes for an entirely different 'spread show to be sure. While the insanely long sprawling jams are all but absent here -- only on the final cut, "Rebirtha," do we get anything over 15 minutes, everything else is ten or under -- in place of that are tight, raucous, funky, gritty rock & roll tunes that traverse the worlds of R&B, Latin, and jazz, along with hard-spun, gritty Southern rock. From the opening sequences in "Thought Sausage," the multi-valent percussion drives the band down into itself to concentrate on the tighter grooves rather than the more spacious ones. The New Orleans backbeat in the band's cover of "Use Me," by Bill Withers moves the tune into a whole other sphere. The Dozens punch up the bassline and strut it out more. The only drawback is that John Bell seems unsure of how to deliver the lyric with this new wash of sound behind him. Likewise, "Bayou Lena," feels a bit stilted -- while the horns are free and easy and add a ton of life to the tune's atmosphere, the Panics seem unwilling to pull out all the stops. But these are minor complaints. Tracks like "Bust It Big," and "Old Neighborhood," and the wailing trance-out soul grit in "Arleen" more than make up for it. And of course the diehards get the acid groove beauty of "Rebirtha" to tide them over until the next multi-disc live set comes along. This is an experiment to be sure, but one that works well for the most part. ~ Thom Jurek
Like their jam-happy predecessors the Grateful Dead and their contemporaries Phish, Widespread Panic exist mostly to play live, using studio-based recordings mainly as a jumping-off point for their more exuberant onstage outings. So it goes with NIGHT OF JOY, actually recorded over two nights at the House of Blues in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.
Old friends the Dirty Dozen Brass Band, previously featured on 2000's ANOTHER JOYOUS OCCASION, return to provide further funky backdrops to tunes ranging from the familiar (the smoldering "Arleen" and the mighty New Orleans groove of "Bayou Lena") to covers (Bill Withers's "Use Me" and a Southern-fried version of Stevie Wonder's "I Wish"). Meanwhile, the core band expertly dissects and reinvents old favorites such as "Thought Sausage" and the distinctly 1970s-sounding "Rebirtha," here heard as a triumphant 17-minute finale. For those unable to see the actual shows, NIGHT OF JOY provides both the next best thing and another document of WP's ever-expanding live expertise.

W/Dirty Dozen Brass Band Live 11/03 Myrtle Beach.Hits & Covr