Allen Toussaint album: The Bright Mississippi

I will look for that episode of Treme Chazro.

Martykl, SQ = sound quality? I presume...

I was thinking about The Bright Mississippi album and noticed I did not give my own two cents. It occured to me the beat is a bit reminisent of Tom Waits (of course these musicians hold their own nicely) and the music is dripping in atmosphere. I love the variety of instruments.

This is my first exposure to Allen and I was a bit surprised to find his other albums are quite different. They seem a bit more rockin with a slight pop quality. It does not take away from the fact that he is very good on piano no doubt.

The Bright Mississippi is considered Toussaint's 1st Jazz record. For those not familiar with the recording, it's NOT a standard ol' school Jazz record. A beautiful recording, intelligently written and played. A bit on the somber side, but beautiful nonetheless.

The Treme episode I mentioned earlier featuring Toussaint (he actually cameo'd on a few episodes!) was Season 1, episode 10 "I'll Fly Away" (if you got HBOGO you can watch it right now!). Treme gets my vote as the best musical televison show EVER!

Allen Toussaint was also on a PBS show. It was either Soundstage or Austin City Limits. I think it was Soundstage. He played some songs from the Bright Mississippi album. Watch for the replay.

I just did a search. Allen was on Austin City Limits.

Phil,

SQ is sound quality and I think it's one of the better sounding releases in recent memmory.

Toussaint has had an almost unbelieveable depth of r'n'r impact. Very early on, he had a hit with "Workin' In a Coal Mine" and wrote Ernie K-Doe's hit "Mother In Law". Shortly thereafter, he produced all the records by "The Showmen", including "It Will Stand" one of the earlier r'n'r anthems and an early example of morphing doo-wop style vocal music into r'n'r, ala The Beach Boys.

In the '70's/'80's he released an awesome array of pop/funk records, the best known of which is propbably "Southern Nights". (His 2 cd Warner Bros Years retrospective is tremendous.) He was also a major influence on Lowell George of Little Feat and really schooled a lot of white folk on the basics of funk.

Bright Mississippi is great, but it's really far afield from Toussaint's historical sweet spot, so loving this record (as I do) doesn't guarantee that you'll dig the earlier stuff. But, OTH, you just might.

Marty