Customer Reviews

Dixie Chicken

5 star:		(24)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

It would be accurate to describe Little Feat in its original configuration as a very good band fronted by a genius, but it doesn't adequately acknowledge just how very, very good the other members of the band were. Lowell George was on a totally different level than the other members, but they weren't dispensable for all that. Although both LITTLE FEAT and SAILIN' SHOES, their first two albums, are exceedingly close to being as fine as the masterful DIXIE CHICKEN, what separates the latter for the previous two is the astonishingly accomplished playing of the other band members. George remains the focal point of the group, writing an exceptional set of songs and providing powerful lead vocals, but far more than the earlier two albums, the rest of the band holds its own. Stylistically, this one shows a deep influence by New Orleans music, and even features an Allen Toussaint tune.

Although they went on to release a couple of more decent albums before their break up in the late 1970s, as well as an exceptional live album WAITING FOR COLUMBUS, this represents Little Feat's supreme studio achievement. Absolutely everything clicks on this album, and the eclectic nature of all the songs seems utterly natural. The band manages throughout the album to sound simultaneously restrained and impassioned. Unlike many bands who work in a variety of styles, they never sound like they are doing a parody of any genre.

Despite the improvements in the band as a whole, this is still Lowell George's outfit. George undoubtedly belongs to a short list of musicians whose premature death (of a heart attack at age 34) deprived us of a significant body of work. I have been amazed at how many of my musically astute friend are not aware of George. I'm uncertain whether I most appreciate Lowell George the songwriter or Lowell George the singer. There is no question he was a master crafter of first rate songs, but he was every bit as good as a singer, with a full, round lower register capable of sliding into a marvelous upper range.

For those new to Little Feat, I strongly recommend four albums to the would-be collector. In addition to this stellar album, one should get both LITTLE FEAT and SAILIN' SHOES, both of them featuring one of the finest songs written in the past 30 years, George's spectacular "Willin'." I never saw Little Feat live, I'm sorry to say, but they had a reputation for being one of the best live bands around, and their WAITING FOR COLUMBUS has to rank as one of the better live albums ever cut. Little Feat broke up in the late seventies and reformed in the late 1980s, but without George they were merely a good band instead of a great one. These four albums will give most fans all the Little Feat that they would ever desire.

It was quite a complement to bassist Roy Estrada that when he left Little Feat to rejoin the Mothers, he should be replaced by no fewer than three musicians: a bassist, another guitarist and another percussionist. SAILIN' SHOES had been well-regarded but commercially unsuccessful (until its CD re-release). Lowell George continued to write songs about his drugs habit, which was getting worse: going from 'cocaine trees' to the 'Fat Man in the Bathtub'.

Paul Barrere auditioned on bass and failed. Thankfully George gave him a second chance -- this time, on guitar. Barrere's guitar noodles are vital to the Feat sound.

What overpowers me about this album is the barrage of excessively good tracks: no sooner have you got over the perfection of 'Dixie Chicken', than you have the intricate rhythms and guitar work of 'Two Trains' to handle. And then the acoustic marvel that is 'Roll Um Easy'. Outstanding tracks keep coming, and they still haven't reached either of my two favourites, the keyboards-led 'Kiss It Off' and the gorgeous love-song, 'Juliette'. The keyboards are excellent throughout this album. Malcolm Cecil, who introduced Stevie Wonder to the synthesizer prior to MUSIC OF MY MIND, provides the dominant instrumental contribution to 'Kiss It Off' (as he did on the Doobie Brothers' CAPTAIN & ME).

The album is a masterpiece, but commercially it dived, at least initially. Maybe it was something as crazy as the cover, which is one of Neon Park's plainest and least surreal, which failed to attract enough buyers. Warner Brothers didn't know what to do with the LP, later re-issuing it as a very cheap double LP with SAILIN' SHOES.

By the time that THE LAST RECORD ALBUM was released, people began to appreciate DIXIE CHICKEN's classic status. Lowell George could do no wrong -- at least on record -- and everyone seemed to want him on their album, including Robert Palmer, the McGarrigle sisters and Jackson Browne. It is simply a brilliant album, with a huge variety of styles, all smouldering within an undefinable New Orleans genre.

Dixie Chicken is Little Feat's third album and is regarded among longtime fans as their best work. Like their previous albums, Little Feat and Sailin' Shoes, Dixie Chicken would garner much critical acclaim but slow sales. The album also showed a change in direction in their music. While Sailin' Shoes was steeped in country, blues, and boogie music, Dixie Chicken is laid back and funkier. This would also be the album to debut longtime Feat members Paul Barrere, Sam Clayton, and Kenny Gradney. Barrere, in particular, would play a pivotal role in the band, gradually writing more songs with their later releases and would be the major voice of the band when they regrouped in 1988.

But Lowell George was still the star of the show on Dixie Chicken, writing most of the songs and adding those gruff distinctive lead vocals to every track. As for the songs, they're all very good although I believe the tracks on Sailin' Shoes are slightly better overall. The title track is to this day the band's best and most memorable song, featuring clever wordplay and slide guitar from George and a memorable piano hook from Bill Payne. Country superstar Garth Brooks would later do a respectable cover of this in the `90s, in effect introducing the greatness of Little Feat to a whole new audience. "Fat Man in the Bathtub", another one of George's great story songs, is arguably their second best track with Richie Hayward lending the opening hook with his busy drum line. While the rest of the tracks aren't as widely known, they're all very strong. Songs like the funky "Two Trains", the rollicking "Walkin' All Night", and the dark blues of "On Your Way Down" show George in all of his glory with some of the sweetest slide playing you'll ever hear and the female backing vocals, performed by future superstar Bonnie Raitt among others, providing a nice touch. Another great track is "Fool Yourself", which was written by Fred Tackett, who would later join Little Feat when they reunited for the Let It Roll album and continues to play a major role in the band. "Lafayette Railroad" is a cool instrumental that the band continues to play live while "Juliette", with its arrangement and solemn flute line, recalls a livelier version of Traffic. "Roll Um Easy" and "Kiss It Off" are both very laid back tunes with George's vocals providing the perfect accompaniment. All told, Dixie Chicken is one of the best works from one of the finest American rock bands. Highly recommended.

Back in the day albums came on two sides and had artwork that rivaled the best contemporary art. In those days an Album was a work of art, not a product to be shifted. If you have not yet heard this CD, get out that credit card and choose overnight shipping. You will thank me.

I came across Little Feat a few years ago by way of trading Grateful Dead, Phish and Dave Matthews Band bootlegs. I downloaded a complete show from 1973 from sharingthegroove.org. Well the RIAA took down Sharingthegrove with a lawsuit (guess they want everyone to pay for the groove), but I still have that bootleg. And one week later I owned ever official recorded piece of music Lowell George and company produced. Take that Hillary Rosen!

You may have heard "Dixie Chicken" by way of Garth Brooks. Get that version out of your mind right now. He didn't get it. This isn't country music, it's immersed in the blues --Lowell George's language. Fried in the blues may be more accurate-- blues infatuated with New Orleans R&B and mellow jamming. Get this first and go forwards and then backwards though the little feat catalog. And think, where else can you find over a half hour of bliss for less than 10.99?

It's great to see that the Feats still maintain an audience after many of their 70's rock bretheren have become pitchmen for new golf hardware or mutual funds. Just don't call them a "Southern Rock" band and please don't compare them to the Dead; their sound transcends both. Just as New Orleans as a city has a complexity of cultural influences and a cosmopolitan feel that make it more interesting than, say, Atlanta, Little Feat managed to create a workable hybrid using rythmic, lyric, and textural subtlety that put them in a category all their own. With the possible exception of Steely Dan they represented the pinnacle of American rock in the seventies. From the first bars of "Dixie Chicken" you know this is a potent and spicy mix of Big-Easy funk and blues-rock cooked up with the right amount of LA studio sheen. With their third album they found the right combination of personnel and their sound crystallized to a degree not found before or after. Even the inevitable, borderline "throw-away" songs (there's always a couple on any rock album, I won't mention which ones they are on this one) have enough musical interest that you won't lift the needle or hit the skip button. Strong throughout, this is a virtuoso band caught at the height of their powers; it's worth it just for "Fat Man in the Bathtub" alone. By the way, as someone who saw both Little Feat and the Grateful Dead perform live in the mid-seventies, I can say without question that the Feats actually had a sense of meter and structure and could really play their instruments (enough about that).

One of the best CD's I own. You can actually stand to listen to the entire CD, it's not one of those you buy just for a song or two. TWO TRAINS is a great track, as is the comical DIXIE CHICKEN, FAT MAN IN THE BATHTUB is also an excellent track.
ROLL EM EASY is beautiful, just a beautiful song. Great lyrics with simple guitar.

All of the albums with Lowell George are worth buying, but this is the must have.

Little Feat went on to create an album that wasn't a "hit parade" like the previous one, "Sailin' Shoes", but was more smoothly-flowing and stylish. Here, the overall mood is rather serious - only the superb title track with it's nice piano opening and powerful female backing vocals, the amusingly titled "Fat Man in the Bathtub", and perhaps to some extent, "Two Trains", represent the fun-loving side of LF. From the productive pen of Allen Toussaint came the slow, pensive "On Your Way Down" with a message worth listening to... "Fool Yourself" and "Juliette" are pretty much chipped from the same stone, both melodic pop songs made memorable by George's high pitched singing throughout. "Lafayette Railroad" is a surprisingly enjoyable instrumental despite being so simplistic. Kenny Gradney's bass repeating a simple riff over Richard Hayward's calm drumming, and the guitar weaving melodic lines throughout. Laid-back, and so soothing.

Style as well as substance, but the fun was saved for the next album, where LF took things a bit more lightly...

Have you ever felt the sticky warmth of a Spring Day in the French Quarter? Well here it is. Although the boys in Little Feat hailed from Los Angeles after a stint with the late great Frank Zappa, Lowell George, Bill Payne, and Co. formulated a funked out, tripped up, menagerie of the best of America. From the soaring of the Allman-esqe guitars, the Professor Longhair twinkle of the ivories, or the sexy rythyms of the Neville's, Little Feat twisted this up into the tastiest album of the 1970's. "....and we can walk together down in Dixie-yeahhhhhh-land!" And that is what Dixie Chicken will do. Take you for, well, a shuffle.

...maybe. This, the first album from the reformed Little Feat, is a much looser, funkier album than "Sailin' Shoes" or their debut. This is attributed to the inclusion of bassist Kenny Gradney, guitarist Paul Barrere and precussionist Sam Clayton and their musical mixing input. "Dixie Chicken" is a watershed album and the title track "Two Trains" and "Fat Man in the Bathtub" are brillaint tunes. But the album is much more than just those three songs. "Walkin' All Night," "Roll Um Easy" and "On Your Way Down" are just as good (although I think "Juliette" is kind of a dud). What makes this album a winner, though, is the direction it pointed the group in. Never again would they be considered the non-southern southern rock band. They became a funky groove machine that played all styles of music and, by God, played them well. A perfect place to start.

Really, I did listen to rock musics from late 60s to early 70s, but the rockmusics sounds usually did not send me into "7th heaven", then, less even now.

I heard one evening from the radio (of ALL places), the "Vanilla soul" sweet like honey voice of one Lowell George singing the centerpiece composition of this recording, "Giuliette", and I was IMMEDIATE hooked ! He sang the stars outta those words!

I purchased the vinyl disc ASAP, and found myself enjoying this Los Angeles native son's version of New Orleans -influenced sounds and subtle country-rock (ay madre!) very much .

The addition of Paul Barrere (guitar) and Bill Payne (keyboards) to the group (I read their history) added some more fluent solo stylings IMO, and later to bring a quase-jazz influence to the band in the next 2 releases, a blessing to the ears for someone as I who was a "jazzman" to begin with.

Aside the aforementioned gem "Giuliette",
Lowell's aching vocalistics (he had the "cry" for sure,a rare gift) grace the mysterious "Kiss it Off"(Can I call a composition called Kiss it off "mysterious, hehehe!),

and his Allen Toussaint(guests on keys) vudu-mojo "warning " of Karma payback in "On the Way Down" is ALMOST "Gris- Gris" period Dr John (the Night Tripper)one better!

I care less for the rocking sounds on the cd, but, as most who probably are visiting this review now can be assured, the rockmusics are a joy, and each tune has at least one creative "trick" up the sleeve that sets it above being just a "pedestrian" rock tune.

"Fool Yourself" is such fine country rock styling (as was the original Little Feat more married to this sound), it makes the "real thing" Country rock groups sound "inferior".

Take it from a "jazz-Brasilian musics snobby " elitista, if I enjoy this CD, one with more rock roll sympathies should get even more enjoyment from the recording.

I have not keep track of this group since the live recording with the "Swinging Tomato" on the cover, but I imagine, even without the Lowell George (Who passed from this planeta much too soon), they are still making nice sounds. (Are they?)

100000 stars for the compositions I love on this recording, and you can choose how many constellations on the other songs for yourself, enjoy please!