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The Traveling Wilburys’ cover ‘End of the Line’ works beautifully with its characteristic New
Orleans marching band drum beat and restrained brass and with Katie Pruitt and Aaron Neville
also adding their vocals, the title track is a Johnny Cash song which Mac delivers in a very
moving way — reminiscent of some of Johnny’s later records produced by Rick Rubin. The
remaining songs are all originals, the bluesy ‘Holy Water’ also has Katie Pruitt adding her
vocals and ‘Sleeping Dogs Best Left Alone’ is one of Mac’s better vocal deliveries. If Mac’s voice
isn’t as strong as it once was this only adds a certain charm to some of the songs and he still
has that ‘feel’. The band support him wonderfully, they are Shane Theriot (guitars), Tony Hall
(bass), Carlo Nuccio and Herlin Riley (drums) David Torkanowsky and Jon Cleary (keyboards),
Mark Mullins (trombone), Alonzo Bowens (tenor sax) and Leonard Brown (trumpet).
Graham Harrison
Miko Marks and The Resurrectors—Feel Like Going Home
—Redtone records
Miko Marks’ band is called The Resurrectors —probably
because they resurrected her career. She is originally from Flint,
Michigan and started out in the early 2000s as a country singer
but after two albums which never quite made it she quit the
music business. Now she’s back fifteen years later with her
producers/band members, Steve Wyreman and Justin Phipps
(who also co-wrote the songs with her), with a record that
mixes blues, gospel, rock and soul with country sounds. ‘Feel Like Going Home’ is a great way
to start, a powerful soul ballad and the catchy ‘One More Night’ carries on in a similar vein
with shout-outs for New Orleans, Memphis, Muscle Shoals, Muddy Waters, Lightnin’ Hopkins,
Howlin’ Wolf and Big Mama (Thornton) — which seems to define the music here. ‘River’ is
even better, a bluesy song with slide guitar and harmonica, while ‘This Time’ is a lovely melodic
mid-tempo ballad and ‘Peace of Mind’ is another gospel-inflected soul ballad with heartfelt
vocals from Miko.
‘Trouble’ ups the pace with its pounding drums and Miko and the backing singers soaring over
the top, ‘The Good Life’ is a subdued country ballad and ‘Deliver Me’ is searing gospel — with
both highlighting Miko’s outstanding and versatile voice. ‘The Other Side’ and ‘Lay Your
Burdens Down’ are both more country influenced tracks and ‘Jubilee’ mixes gospel and
country. I’m really glad that The Resurrectors came along for Miko this is a really good album
that mixes genres to great effect, with catchy commercial songs that have the charm of country
but the depth of blues — I thought that it had a real 60s feel and reminded me of great 60s
artists like Delaney and Bonnie and The Band who also mixed genres in a similar way.
Graham Harrison