Too Many Millionaires Darren Watson

• 1 Hallelujah (Rich Man's War) 03:52
• 2 National Guy 04:56
• 3 Mean Me Right Blues 04:53
• 4 Pilgrim 03:05
• 5 Too Many Millionaires 04:05
• 6 Un-Love Me 04:45
• 7 That Guy Could Sing! 03:55
• 8 Past Tense 03:09
• Total Runtime 32:40

Info zu Too Many Millionaires

With a career stretching back to the late 1980s, Darren Watson is by now one of this country’s most well-respected blues artists – musician, songwriter and singer. Influences like John Hiatt, Lyle Lovett, and of course Wellington genius songwriter Bill Lake come through strongly as well. This isn’t just a collection of lyrics hurriedly-written to fill in between solos, Watson has something to say and says it with flair and subtlety in equal measure.

Eschewing modern recording & overdubbing techniques almost altogether, Watson sat in front of valve and ribbon microphones for two days at Wellington’s Surgery Studios last November with only his ‘50s vintage Gibson acoustic guitar and his lived-in voice. Joined by a handpicked acoustic band including blues harmonica virtuoso Terry Casey, he and the band played ‘live to tape’ through a selection of his newest compositions. The best takes were kept and mixed by multi award-winning engineer Lee Prebble. The result is an immediacy and intimacy that Watson does not think he has captured on any of his previous, more ‘polished’ recordings.

This raw production serves Watson well, the performances sound more immediate, his political and social messages sharper. Watson’s material is drawn from what he terms ‘all over’ the roots music spectrum, especially recalling the blues tradition stretching back to the early 20th century.

Clocking in at a short, sharp 33 minutes, the eight songs of ‘Too Many Millionaires’ show Watson comfortable working in the realm of authentic blues, and potentially pointing to an altered course for his own approach to the blues.

"When I made the decision to record an acoustic album in early 2017 I really had no idea what shape it would take. I knew I had some decent new songs and wanted to do something different from my usual go into the studio and just do the same thing again routine. My very first idea was to simply record myself playing the tunes solo – so I setup a couple of mics to do a simple test recording of what that might sound like. I just popped the words down in front of me and did each song once through to see if they worked. This is what you can download here. I thought then and I think now that they stand up on their own. Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad I took my amazing friends into the studio and put them down live with the extra instrumentation. But I could have just released these songs like this I reckon . . . maybe with me not messing up the words so much, but they work as performances, right? Maybe that’s next for me? I dunno. I know I owe you an album soon,

Anyway, for those who are vaguely interested I thought I’d release these very honest, one-take solo recordings of the songs from Too Many Millionaires before they were refined into the performances you’re familiar with." (Darren Watson)

Darren Watson, guitar, vocals
Steve Moodie, guitar
Aaron Stewart, double bass
Terry Casey, harmonica
Delia Shanly, drums, percussion

Darren Watson
is a New Zealand singer, guitarist and songwriter known for his soulful blend of blues, roots and sharp-edged songwriting. After early success with Chicago Smoke Shop in the late '80s, he built a respected solo career, most recently with powerful and original acoustic blues albums like Too Many Millionaires (2018), and the Tui-nominated Getting Sober for the End of the World (2020).

Whanganui and the Hutt Valley are a long way from the Mississippi Delta, but they both have rivers, and stories. Singer, songwriter and guitarist Darren Watson grew up in these places and caught on to the blues as a teenager in the early 1980s, after seeing Muddy Waters in the movie The Last Waltz.

Watson was already performing blues and rock in high-school bands, but something in Muddy’s performance and guitar playing inspired the budding bassist (and trumpeter) to take up the electric guitar and develop his singing style. Buying records was out of the question for the teenage Darren and his mate Terry Casey, so in those pre-internet days they hit the Wellington Public Library blues section and took home supplies of Muddy, and the three Kings – BB, Freddie and Albert – stuffed tightly into green canvas library record bags.

Dieses Album enthält kein Booklet