Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
Roads are there to be travelled, no matter how long and straight it looks, it will lead somewhere. The road to Hell paved with good intentions, the sunny side of the street or the enclosed, tempting and quiet cul-de-sac in which you may never depart; all have their points of interest and all should contain a reason to be there. For the superbly talented Dana Fuchs the road is one in which Ruf Records have placed her vibrant live set down for all to hear and in Songs From The Road everything sounds sweet, vivacious and only enhances the Florida musician’s reputation.
The live C.D. alongside its accompanying D.V.D. is, as always, captured in the raw. There is no trickery or enhancement placed on the shoulders of a giant, this is as if you had stepped off the street, the rain pelting it down and causing drivers to look for their next puddle-dashed victim and finding yourself in a bar off 77th Street, the heaving, appreciative mass of people cheering loudly and every sinew on the singer’s throat pulsating with desire and a set of musicians looking down with pride at their calloused fingers. Not only is it live and in the raw, but it untainted and untouched by the studio overdub and plastic, synthetic feel; it is the genuine piece of work that captures the point of going to a live gig and not having it mucked about by very clever technicians.
Dana Fuchs’ Songs From The Road captures some of her most gilded moments, her gravitas and that talked of desire but there is a sadness in the music as well in which she dedicates a song to her late brother. It is that memory that makes the listener know that this was done live, there is no way it should be ignored for the moment of tangible beauty that it is.
With a whole host of songs in which to revel and feel jealous of those who were in attendance at the gig, tracks such as Handful Too Many, How Did Things Get This Way, the utterly tremendous Tell Me I’m Not Drinking and Rodents in the Attic and I’ve Been Loving You Too Long, this may be the road less travelled, the unbeaten path but it is completely an avenue in which bliss and contentment collide with pleasure.
Ian D. Hall