Album Review: TajMo, ‘Room on the Porch’
On their 2017 debut album TajMo, Grammy Award-winning artists Taj Mahal and Keb’ Mo’ found a groove and locked in on it. They ride the magic of that groove onto their new album Room on the Porch. These two world-class guitarists, songwriters, and singers revel in the intricate intimacy of two friends sitting around making music and the community that such songs form.
With its layers of slide guitar, guitar, and fiddle cascading softly, the title track, which opens the album, washes over us warmly, inviting us into the “room on the porch” where we can all share our troubles, dreams, and hopes. The track features vocals from Ruby Amanfu, and she and Taj Mahal beckon us to “Come on up/There’s room on the porch for everyone.” Bright banjo picking introduces “My Darling, My Dear,” a shimmering love song that features Taj Mahal delivering call-and-response lines to Keb’ Mo’s lilting baritone lead vocals, as well as ethereal background vocals that lift the mid-tempo ballad. The duo’s version of the classic “Nobody Knows You When You’re Down and Out” is a swaying, gospel- and jazz-inflected piece with wailing organ, full-throated choruses, and smooth, swinging guitar. “Junkyard Dog” is a stride blues that tells a sly down-to-the-bone tale about moving on from a love gone wrong. The slow-burning, juke joint number “Blues’ll Give You Back Your Soul” snakes its way along Taj Mahal’s growling vocals and a blaring sax instrumental bridge, while the Calypso-inflected “Better Than Ever,” featuring Wendy Moten on vocals, jumps along rhythmically, celebrating the positive beauty of a right relationship (“my life with you is better than ever”). The album closes with a darker vision than it begins with “Rough Time Blues,” an acoustic blues that laments the economic difficulties of hard times.
Room on the Porch showcases the musical brilliance of these two musicians and their ability to find a musical theme in a song, follow it down, and innovate around it. Each song sparkles with gem-like radiance.
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Room On the Porch is available HERE.
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