Southside Johnny came up through the same Asbury Park, New Jersey-area bars and clubs as Bruce Springsteen, with whom he has often shared stages. He also attended school with the E Street Band’s Garry Tallent and Vini Lopez; garnered his “Southside” nickname from Springsteen; formed his group with Steve Van Zandt, who went on to fame with Bruce; and frequently performs songs written or co-written by Springsteen or Van Zandt. But the similarities to the Boss don’t end there. While more rooted in R&B than Springsteen, Southside shares his ability to enthrall audiences with a strong stage presence and electrifying performances.
For abundant evidence of that, pick up Live at Rockpalast 1979 & 1992, which offers two concerts by the singer (aka John Lyon) and his band, the Asbury Jukes. The shows, which aired on Germany’s long-running Rockpalast (Rock Palace) TV program, were issued on DVD in 2004. A new version, however, delivers the concerts on both DVD and CD. It’s part of an extensive series from the television show that has included audio/video releases devoted to such artists as Graham Parker, Paul Young, Canned Heat, Johnny Winter, and Stray Cats.
The three CDs and two DVDs in the Southside set contain nearly identical programs. (The only difference involves a nine-minute ostensible “interview” that ends one of the video discs. It consists mostly of a superficial conversation between the singer and a sometimes German-speaking questioner.) The 1979 concert, which runs just over an hour, took place at the Grugahalle arena in Essen, Germany. It features 13 numbers, including Springsteen’s “Talk to Me” and “The Fever” as well as “Trapped Again,” which Southside wrote with the Boss and Van Zandt. Also here are Van Zandt’s “Got to Be a Better Way Home” and “I Don’t Want to Go Home” and such Southside favorites as “All I Want Is Everything,” which the singer co-wrote with band member Billy Rush.
It’s a memorable gig, but the 1992 concert, from the Music Hall in Cologne, Germany, is even better. Clocking in at two and a half hours and repeating only a few songs from the older show among its 24 selections, it features an entirely different backup band that includes a terrific horn section (sax, trumpet, and trombone). And just when you think things can’t get any hotter, Van Zandt shows up to sing and play guitar on the show’s five final numbers.
The concert is especially riveting in the video version, where Southside – who looks like a man possessed and whose movements may sometimes remind you of Joe Cocker – runs through a set dominated by songs written or co-written by Springsteen and/or Van Zandt. Among them are a 12-minute reading of “The Fever” and an arena-shaking “Talk to Me,” as well as “Better Days,” “Hearts of Stone,” and “This Time It’s for Real,” which precedes a brassy finish with an arresting a cappella section. There are also back-to-back performances of Sam Cooke’s “Havin’ a Party” and “Wonderful World”; a version of Cream’s “I Feel Free”; and an affecting, vocals-dominated rendition of “Let It Be Me,” the Everly Brothers hit ballad, which Southside dedicates to his wife.
The best cover, though, is arguably “Walk Away, Renee,” the Left Banke’s 1966 baroque rock masterpiece, which Southside often features in his shows. After opening with a soulful, nearly instrument-free reading of the first verse, he remakes the number into a blistering sax-spiced rocker.
The only knock against this release, which Rockpalast founder Peter Ruchel produced, is that its DVDs are not widescreen, and their audio isn’t hi-res. The picture and sound are more than acceptable, however, and the approximately $25 price for this package renders it a bargain.
Also Noteworthy
Lucinda Williams, Lu’s Jukebox, Vol. 7: Lucinda Williams Sings the Beatles from Abbey Road. Lucinda Williams is renowned as a songwriter and performer of her own material, but she’s also a compelling interpretive singer, as demonstrated by her excellent Lu’s Jukebox series, whose first six volumes found her covering Bob Dylan, the Rolling Stones, and Tom Petty, as well as country and Muscle Shoals artists and Christmas tunes.
Now, four years and one delays-prompting pandemic later, Williams has issued a terrific seventh volume in the series, this one focused on the Beatles and recorded, appropriately enough, at Abbey Road studios in London. Williams is such a distinctive vocalist that all the songs wind up sounding as if they’d been written for or even by her. On the program: George Harrison’s “Something” and “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” and 10 John Lennon/Paul McCartney compositions, including such classics as “I’m Looking Through You,” “Let It Be,” and “Can’t Buy Me Love” and one relative obscurity: the trippy “Rain,” which appeared as the B-side of the Beatles’ “Paperback Writer” single.
Lightnin’ Hopkins, The Singles Collection Vol. 1 1946–53 & Vol. 2 1951–62. The great country blues singer, songwriter, guitarist, and sometime pianist Sam “Lightnin’” Hopkins issued dozens and dozens of LPs during his six-decade career, and you can also choose from more than 200 compilation albums, most issued in the years following his death in 1982. It’s hard to know where to begin digging into a discography that large, but these two releases, each containing three CDs, would be as good a place as any.
Culling seven hours of stellar material from many of the labels for which the influential Texas native recorded between 1946 and 1962, the albums include the A and B sides of nearly all his singles during these key years. Among them are the hits “Tim Moore’ Farm,” “T Model Blues,” “Shotgun Blues,” “Give Me Central 209,” and “Coffee Blues.” Other standouts include solo acoustic folk-blues such as “Abilene” and “Baby Please Don’t Go” and electric guitar knockouts like “Hopkins’ Sky Hop” and “Lightnin’s Special.”
Emily Remler, Cookin’ at the Queens: Live in Las Vegas 1984 & 1988. Emily Remler was an extremely talented jazz guitarist, but you’ve probably never heard of her. One reason is that her career was cut short by heroin addiction, which is believed to have contributed to her death at age 32 in 1990. Another is that the new two-CD Cookin’ at the Queens is the first Remler release since that year.
Recorded live for radio broadcasts in 1984 and 1988, the instrumental album includes more than two-and-a-half hours of music, nearly 60 minutes of which never aired. Remler is backed by bassist Carson Smith, drummers Tom Montgomery and John Pisci, and pianist Cocho Arbe as she shows off dazzling technique and style on sets that include Miles Davis’s “So What/Impressions” and “All Blues,” Bobby Timmons’s “Moanin’,” Sonny Rollins’s “Tenor Madness,” and Pat Martino’s “Cisco.” Also on the 17-track program are “D-Natural Blues” and “West Coast Blues,” both by Wes Montgomery,” who served as Remler’s biggest influence.
Jeff Burger’s website, byjeffburger.com, contains five decades’ worth of music reviews, interviews, and commentary. His books include Dylan on Dylan: Interviews and Encounters, Lennon on Lennon: Conversations with John Lennon, Leonard Cohen on Leonard Cohen: Interviews and Encounters, and Springsteen on Springsteen: Interviews, Speeches, and Encounters.
