Blues

Papa Mali – Do Your Thing (2007)

2011-11-03T19:22:51Z

Papa Mali – Do Your Thing (2007)


01. Do Your Thing
02. Honeybee
03. Early in the Morning
04. I Had The Dream					play
05. Little Moses
06. Coffee
07. I'm Gettin' Over It				play
08. Girls In Bossier City
09. Sugarland
10. True Religion
11. Hallelujah I'm A Dreamer

Performer:  
Malcolm "Papa Mali" Welbourne - Arranger, Bass, Composer, Guitar, Vocals
Chuck Prophet 	- Guitar (Electric), Percussion
Dan Prothero  -	Engineer, Graphic Design, Mixing, Photography, Producer, Programming
George Sluppick – Chant
Victoria Williams - Vocals (Background)
Kirk Joseph - Guest Appearance, Sousaphone

Malcolm Welbourne, AKA Papa Mali, can be forgiven for not having a handy identity to hang his MySpace tag on. Though he came to prominence in the 1980s on the Austin, Texas music scene with the legendary reggae band the Killer Bees, Welbourne is a Mississippi native who grew up in Shreveport and has deep ties to the New Orleans music community. Above all, he’s known for his shredding slide guitar work, whether fronting his own band or sitting in with fellow travelers such as the Radiators, Galactic and other New Orleans bands. Do Your Thing, produced by Dan Prothero for Fog City, the San Francisco label central to Galactic’s development, shows all of Mali’s sides, from the Texas honky-tonk of “Honeybee” to the surreal head trip of “Girls In Bossier City.” Mostly, though, this is a classic New Orleans session—all rhythmic nuance and deep, grainy textures. The basic tracks were recorded here at Truck Farm Studios with a core band consisting of Papa Mali, Robb Kidd on drums, Kirk Joseph on sousaphone, Henry Butler on piano and Big Chief Monk Boudreaux on vocals and percussion. Fellow Austinite Victoria Williams adds background vocals on a couple of tracks, but the moment of truth comes when the Golden Eagles Mardi Gras Indians with Reverend Goat Carson throw down on the out-of-this-world chant “Early In the Morning.” This driving, echo-drenched polyrhythmic joy ride transforms the traditional Mardi Gras march into a contemporary slice of voodoo electronica.

Sometimes Prothero makes Mali’s voice sound like he has fallen down a well (“Sugarland”) and on other occasions he could be auditioning for the Gospel Tent (“True Religion”). The bonus track, a pretty acoustic song called “Hallelujah I’m a Dreamer” echoes the soulful chorus of “Save the Last Dance for Me” and suggests that Mali has even more identities lurking in his creative imagination. --- John Swenson, offbeat.com

These guys are so soulful and rife with slide guitar bayoo sound. If you get to New Orleans JazzFest in April/June (which I do every year), you'll hear a lot of this sound. But this band really stands out. Listen to it several times and you'll year different things every time. It's grown on me big time since I've owned it. First I liked it. Now I LOVE IT. The songs are all wonderful, but 'Early in the Morning' and 'Coffee' are the living best. Their other albums are JUST as good. --- Philly Kristin "MusicMeistress" (Philadelphia, PA United States)

Papa Mali's second album, Do Your Thing starts with the freaky psych-funk vibe of the spooky title track, which wouldn't sound out of place on Funkadelic's Maggot Brain. That druggy vibe continues on the Hendrixian "Early in the Morning," a veiled rewrite of "Hey Joe," and the grinding, fuzz bass-powered "I Had the Dream." Throughout the album, deep soul and blues elements like the Delta slide guitar on "Little Moses" and the playful shuffle beat of "I'm Getting over It" clash intriguingly with distorted vocals, jagged feedback explosions, oddball lyrics and other indie rock accoutrements. It makes for a more interesting and entertaining listen than the usual Chicago blues clich¿s from guys who think nothing of interest has happened in the blues since before Howlin' Wolf died: gems like the menacing, reverb-heavy instrumental "Girls in Bossier City" and the heavy, fuzz-drenched groove of "Sugarland" are too weird for the average fan of polite white-boy blooze, but they're also way closer to the roots of the Delta than the likes of Jon Spencer and Jack White. Do Your Thing is the meeting point between those two opposing sides, taking the best of both while ignoring most of the annoying bits. ---Stewart Mason

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Papa Mali – Thunder Chicken (2000)

2011-10-29T13:09:14Z

Papa Mali – Thunder Chicken (2000)


01. All Right You Got It
02. Bon Ton Roulet
03. Man Of Many Words				play
04. Walk On Guilded Splinters
05. Im The One
06. La Bebida Por Su Vida
07. Keep Happy						play
08. Fleabite Junior The Third
09. If I Ever Get Right
10. Fire Water
11. Cottonfields And Bayous
12. Skeleton Bug
13. South Austin Lullaby

Papa Mali And The Instagators: 
Malcolm "Papa Mali" Welbourne (vocals, guitar);
Tomas Ramirez (saxophone); 
Claude McCan (keyboards, background vocals); 
Courtney Audain (bass, background vocals); 
Barry "Frosty" Smith (drums); 
Bevis "Katdaddy" Griffin, Paul "Buddha" Mills (percussion, background vocals).
+
George Carver (bass harmonica, background vocals); 
Sarah Brown (bass, background vocals).

According to legend, Thunder Chicken is the moniker for a kind of fortified wine that helped Malcolm "Papa Mali" Welbourne) evolve, from his early years as a crazy music-freak kid with a six-string slung over his shoulder to the swamp-funk-hoodoo-slide-guitar-choogler he's become. Along with his smoking band, the Instagators, he concocts a back-alley brand of Louisiana parade sass that meets bluesy Austin, TX grit in a gumbo of the deeply greasy variety; it becomes something joyfully lusty and intoxicating in its own right. As a singer, Mali's dirty-ass slide axe struts in front of him and he's a deep-voiced soulful growler. But it's drummer Barry Frosty Smith who whips the band into the tight, cracking, oily funk machine that can slay you on record as well as in a live setting. And that's what Thunder Chicken is, a beautifully dose of voodoo blues, and raucous pumped up Southern funk and roll. Produced by the Dan Prothero, the true king of raw, Thunder Chicken is one of the few truly wild and unruly records to come from the rock & roll tradition in the 21st century.

Mali and Smith are assisted by bassist Courtney Audain who also plays udu and bones, otherworldly vocalist Bevis Griffin, Claude McCan on various in-the-pocket keyboards, percussionist Paul "Buddha" Mills, and sax ace Tomás Ramírez. The program includes a hefty dose of Louisiana swamp and party music. There's a joint-poppin' nasty read of Clifton Chenier's "Bon Ton Roulet," and a completely reinvented predatory version of Buddy Guy's swaggering "Man of Many Words," with a killer meat-and-potatoes sax line by Ramírez and one of the filthiest basslines in recorded music history. In addition, Mali's cover of the Wild Magnolias' "Fire Water" takes the chant at the heart of the original and turns it into some kind of way-past-midnight hallucinatory processional. The hinge of this set, though, is the nearly ten-minute read of Dr. John's classic "Walk on Gilded Splinters." The tune is a tranced-out, stoned, lonesome unholy blues with a Fender Rhodes and Mali's droning electric guitar punctuated ominously by the whip-crack snare of Smith. His vocal and Griffin's spooky wail in the background take the listener on a labyrinthine journey into the heart of darkness. Smith and Welbourne's "Keep Happy" is a cut-time guttural funk blues with lots of slide-guitar power chords, whomping snare, and maniacal distortion -- it feels like Buddy Guy fronting the Rolling Stones on "Midnight Rambler." The rest of the Welbourne originals stick close to the vein, the vein that is murky and unruly, full of surprises and killer riffs and hooks that could seduce a virtual street-full of revelers. "Cottonfields and Bayous" makes a case for this band being a thoroughly modern construct.

The Instagators may deeply honor their musical heritage, but they're far from stuck in it. This feedback and slow strolling, freak-out hymn to the backwaters could only have been made in the 21st century with its hypnotic, twisted basslines that bust like a geyser from the speakers and reverb-drenched guitars behind the whispering keys and backbeat-driven drums. Originally issued on Prothero's Fog City and re-released by Jim Markel's Swampland, this record is timeless, sexy, and dangerous in its roots-man groove.. ---Thom Jurek, allmusic.com

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Papa Mali - Detriot Lakes, MN 2008

2010-01-12T22:03:57Z

Papa Mali - Detroit Lakes, MN 2008

Disc 1
01. Intro -> Keep Happy 
02. Do Your Thing 
03. Loan Me A Dime 
04. Fire Water 
05. I'm A Ram 

Disc 2 
01. Intro -> The Girls In Bossier City 
02. Morning Sun 
03. Intro to: I Walk On Guilded Splinters 
04. I Walk On Guilded Splinters

Papa Mali 
July 23, 2008 
Field Stage 
Detroit Lakes, MN

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