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CD REVIEWS FOR THE DIRTY SUITE
Category: Music
"Ruben Dobbs channels raw blues power with aggressive slide guitar playing and robust vocals that bring to mind the ghosts of Son House and Leadbelly."
Cary Wolfson Nationally syndicated host of "Blues From the Red Rooster Lounge"
"Whiskey-soaked deep woods field holler for the modern
age.
Step up to the counter and get your Swamp Candy.
It's raw & rockin'. It's dark & dirty.
And you don't want it any other way.
Delicious.
Great record."
--Willie Nile
"Ruben Dobbs has done a masterful job evoking the spirit of Robert Johnson and John Lee Hooker on his new album, "SWAMPCANDY". You get the feeling he's been down to the crossroads. He is a man possessed"
Bob Waugh, Program Director, WRNR-FM.
The Dirty Suite is an exceptional collection of gritty, funky, murky, and definitely dirty (as the title implies) songs that pay homage to the Delta with a set full of bottleneck guitar playing, bass drum thumping, Cocaine-and-whiskey, my-baby-left-me blues. The ten originals and two covers on The Dirty Suite are comprised of solo, duo, and band performances from Swampcandy, a.k.a. Ruben Dobbs. Dobbs, formerly of the bands Burn the Fields, Feed Bag, Fungo Bat, the on-again, off-again Dingleberry Dynasty, and who previously went by the name Velvet Thud, gets down and dirty on The Dirty Suite. With a stripped-down, emotionally-charged, sometimes raw sound, it has an edge to it that recalls the gritty blues sound of Howlin' Wolf and Elmore James. Dobbs, who can growl, groan, and moan with the best of them, gives it his all, and the result is a thoroughly satisfying blues experience. The CD is packed with great originals, and a song each from Son House and Kokomo Arnold. It conveys a true feeling and understanding of the genre and the genuine soul of the blues.
Dobbs, who plays all instruments except harmonica, also produced the album.
The Dirty Suite should appeal to anyone who likes the blues. Its roots extend deep to the south, where they're firmly planted in that rich musical heritage. Swampcandy is helping to preserve the legacy of the blues with an album of authentic-sounding music from a time and place lost, but not forgotten. Check out the Swampcandy myspace page for some downloads.
By Michael Macey Chesapeake Music Guide
Monday, October 08, 2007 from ANY GIVEN TUESDAY
Swampcandy - The Dirty Suite; Free MP3 - "Rosie" Anyone who's been reading this site for more than a minute should know how much I love the Delta blues and artists like Son House and Leadbelly. Lucky me, now I get to like someone that's still alive and (even better) in Maryland. Swampcandy self-released The Dirty Suite (click the album art to purchase), a stomping blues album that sounds like it comes from the front porches of the deep South. The production on the record makes all the difference, artfully retaining the analog and humidity of classic blues recordings. As the recording brings us so close to the real sound of Swampcandy, so does the uncanny vocal quality of Ruben Dobbs come as such a shot in the arm. Armed with a baritone growl and a deep-soul wail, Dobbs blows the doors off on "Insomnia". Also the guitarist, Dobbs slides all over the guitar with down-home hollers like "Rosie" and the downtrodden blues of "So Low". Most of the songs on this album are simple, from a songwriting perspective. Listening to The Dirty Suite, it becomes apparent that the songs reduced to tape can never be reproduced, like any good blues performance. While the songs have a root in a few simple chords, there is a fluidity and free-form quality to the music. Vocals get ad libbed, the guitar slides take on a life of their own, and the foot stomps and hand claps confirm a rabble-rousing good ol' time from song to song. Thankfully, someone has swept the blues out from under the rug and decided to pay homage to the true blues tradition. With homemade percussion from Kevin Lebling in the form of washboard and spoons and the cadent drums of Noel White and Ken Crawn (and lest we leave anyone out, Rurick Reshettelof holding down the lows on bass), this is no modern interpretation of the swamp sounds of the early 20th century, but a revival thereof. If you're new to the blues (and by blues, I mean something much more from the depths than The White Stripes), this is a great introduction. Once you start to feel the sound in your bones, Swampcandy will have done the blues better than most.
Monday, October 08, 2007 from ANY GIVEN TUESDAY
A review written for the Folk & Acoustic Music Exchange (www.acousticmusic.com)
by Tampa Blue
(tampablue@tampablue.com)
At the opening bars of Swampcandy's The Dirty Suite I got excited. Down-dirty, bump-and-grind, moaning-and-groaning blues roots music. I'm thinking that these guys are channeling R.L. Burnside or some other departed Hill-country or Delta blues master.
The ethnomusicologists will get tied in knots over this one. Is it blues or rock? Is it roots or fusion? It is very clearly blues-based but there is also an element of rock that colors most the cuts. Some of the instrumentation could be mistaken as contemporary influenced but Swampcandy (aka Ruben Dobbs) has just done his homework. He has seen the blues in all it's hues.
As the collection progresses, though, it has some problems with maintaining consistent quality. Cuts like South Country, Texas Sun or Sissy Man Blues are genuine and strong. They are well written and masterfully performed. A special treat is Get Me Religion. Those familiar with the blues will recognize this immediately as an alter-ego of Son House's Preaching Blues.
Other cuts are less than inspired. On closer listening it turns out that all the solo and duo tracks start at good and range into the great. The full band tracks are less enjoyable. It is difficult to take a genre of blues that is traditionally a solo genre and transform it into a full band form. R.L. Burnside, The North Mississippi All-Stars, even The White Stripes can do this. Swampcandy hasn't perfected it YET though.
Check out that word "yet." Swampcandy is Dobbs on vocals, drum programing, bass, guitars and foot stompin and Kevin Lebling on harmonica, wash board, spoons and some hand clapping. The full sound they present is particularly impressive when you know that two guys are the source of all this sound. And I love the sound these guys are getting! Great vocals, strong musicianship and some good writing signal that Swampcandy is worth listening too, worth following and worth supporting so that they will be around long enough the figure out the full band treatment of this material.
Dear Ruben,
The parcel you've sent me with Swampcandy's release has reached me safe and sound today, thank you very much!
You have recorded some serious music here, raw and dirty, my kind of blues! It is not a sophisticated music but who said that the blues should be one? Your songs are simple but extremely emotional, carrying a lot of passion for deep Delta sound. From your lyrics, through memorable vocals, to your slide playing and overall sound, all is good. Plus, you music is so full of this primal intensity that it is almost scary. With qualities like that, "The Dirty Suite" brings music more fresh them most of today's hip-hop videos. Heavy stuff!
It will be my pleasure to feature your music in my shows. I will keep you up to date with my playlists and Living Blues reports.
Thank you again Ruben for the music you've sent me! Let us stay in touch.
Best wishes,
Przemek Draheim
phone: +48 609 97 35 29
website: www.blues.pl/draheim
e-mail: draheim@blues.pl
Swampcandy Country: USA Ruben Dobbs is an ambitious man who has a love for the rural blues. Without an agency or record label yet (as far as we know), his band Swampcandy released 'The Dirty Suite', which truly lives up to its name. You know, 'dirt', as in mud, swamp, heavy slide, wailing harp, spoons clicking to the rhythm, bass drums, washboard. Many of the 12 tracks are one-chord-songs, like the old traditional work songs. Some of them are built upon just one guitar riff. Strikingly, not one song is a straight, classical shuffle (as we all know 'blues') so a lot of it sounds like real field hollers, where the dobro takes part in an adventurous, rhythmic journey. There's no sophisticated or elaborated solo work ('Been So Long' though, combines an almost sentimental guitar ditty with rough, crying voices) and, really, a lot of it reminds me of some Tom Waits-production: pots & pans rattling through yells and shouts, hand clapping, dobro-staccato, in a sweaty back porch-feel, voices crossing each other at random. Like a sort of chaotic happy-go-lucky bunch of guys. Don't misinterpret this: I'm all for this, lots of times it works out just fine. Like this time, it really does. The only drawback is that some good possibilities might remain unexplored. For example, the first song, 'South County', has a haunting banjo popping up like a muppet. This is not common in contemporary blues - I'd like to make an exception for Chris Rea's 'Blue Guitars' - but the effect is that a listener with even just a little imagination finds himself thrown smack in the middle of the Mississippi swamps. Great move! And so the question is raised: Why haven't they done this just once more? Vocal improvisation (meaning: no sheet music was distributed amongst the members of the 'choir') has a good part in this CD and it works pretty well. All in all, Swampcandy is a project that should be followed up by every blues lover: you get to witness the way the old blues tradition might have started. The heavy emphasis on rhythm is a major plus, as is the vocal intonation.
Reviewer: Johan Akkermans www.bobtjeblues.com
6:51 PM
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