Gris-Gris

Dr. John

Product Details

• Audio CD (May 9, 2000)
• Original Release Date: 1968
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Collector's Choice
• ASIN: B00004SW9R
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #12,254 in Music (See Bestsellers in Music)

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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com essential recording
Covered in a variegated spray of New Orleans Mardi Gras feathers and shiny voodoo baubles, Mac Rebennack's highly personal mythology was finally made real on this 1968 album. This was his first appearance made under the new guise of Dr. John Creaux, the Night Tripper. Before then, he'd been a pivotal figure on the Crescent City R&B circuit. Afterward, he became one of its most significant blues ambassadors. This album is a classic of the admittedly specialized psychedelic swamp-gumbo genre, boasting at least four tracks that have become cult favorites. "Gris-Gris Gumbo Ya-Ya," "Mama Roux," "Jump Sturdy," and "I Walk on Gilded Splinters" each delicately mix catchy choruses and weird spatial sound effects, with radical stereo separation, intensely croaking, close-quarter vocals from the doctor, pneumatic keyboard riffs, pinprick electric guitar, and booming Afro-Caribbean percussion. The album still stands at its original 33-minute length, with no bonus cuts unearthed, but its high density more than compensates for any brevity. --Martin Lonely

Product Description
Dr. John's 1968 release for Atco, reissued with original artwork and new liner notes. Extremely unique album, one part psychedelia, one part New Orleans R&B and one part...something else , voodoo ritual, maybe. First time on CD in the U.S. Standard jewel case. 2000 release.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

53 of 57 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Je suis la grande zombi..., May 26, 2000

By	fishanthrope "Philip Welsh" (Cambridge, MA) - See all my reviews

There've been various reissues of this album over the years -- Alligator, Repertiore, and now Collector's Choice -- I have no idea how this particular CD edition stands up -- Alligator's was great, Repertiore's sounded like it was mastered off shoddy worn vinyl and then de-noised to such an extent that the sound lost nearly all of its booming depths, and Collector's Choice (though again, I haven't heard this particular version) have as a label distinguished themselves over the past 7 or 8 years by allowing cut-rate remastering talent to come in and ruin some of the 1960s best and most obscure albums (Skip Spence's OAR, the United States of America album, etc.) -- whatever: forewarned is five-armed. As for the album itself, I've safeguarded an original ATCO pressing through countless rent-strikes, burglaries and relocations, and it's one of the few I'd actually admit into that stupid Desert Island Disc rostrum. It's worth reading Rebennack's shambling autobiography to get the larger story, but to wit: a bunch of seasoned New Orleans 50s studio vets, relocated to Los Angeles after many difficult narcotics travails and incarcerations, take advantage of (a) their Atlantic/Ertugen Bros. studio connex, and (b) the ubiquitously gullible hippy thing happening all around them, and come up with a psychedelic voodoo medicine show which (no matter how much of a joke some of them may later make it out to be) is far too genuinely steeped in authenic New Orleans culture and real studio chops to relegate it to the wastebin destined for so many other 'novelty' acts of the time. Chinese-water-torture percussion, snake-slick slide guitar, and Dr. John, the feathered crock-o-the-block himself, chanting fluid paregoric incantations to astral entities the rest of us wouldn't want to come within a light-year of. Scary, and late-night, and positively medieval in places. There have always been certain albums which make evil seem downright fun, but this seething cauldron is their king.

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars This sure is Voodoo Music, January 23, 2003

By	Miguel Angel Martinez Rolland (Madrid Spain) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

The first time I heard this record, I thought: "This is awful: Poorly recorded, out-of-tune instruments and voices, uninspired and pretentious tracks..." I was looking for something like 'Gumbo' -one of my favourite records of all time- and found something completely different instead: No funk, little Blues and almost no piano.
However, after some time, I gave it another try -without any prejudice- and was gladly surprised. I had been mistaken... Next time I realized it, I was wanting to hear 'Walk On Guilded Splinters' and 'Gris-Gris Gumbo Ya-ya' again and again. I read a few things about the great Dr. John and found out that actually those songs (that are not traditional, but composed by himself) were used FOR REAL in vooodoo gatherings and even rites! They sure transmit a very 'haunting' mood, to say the least. Was I hoodooed? -Shivering-
To me, those tracks are worth the entire album, although 'Danse Fambeaux' and 'Mama Roux' are also interesting. The reason why, having such classic tracks, I do not give it the top mark is because I feel that the album is a little too short and uneven. Anyhow, it is still a landmark album for Dr. John that was a very risky bet at the time of its release (Ahmet Ertegun, boss of the record company, hated it).

I bet those sessions were conceived with some mixture of true spirituality and humour. These days, when I feel psychedelic, I play Jimi Hendrix's '1983' or 'Gris-Gris' if I want to shiver a little bit...

18 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars DARK, DIRTY, DENSE, AND DANCEABLE...., May 30, 2001

By	Peppino - See all my reviews

I have also reviewed Babylon, the companion cd to Gris-Gris, and have done a bit of editorializing. This cd deserves only the mention of the musics, Dr. John's "high concept" reaches musical fruition with a swirling array of avant-guard funk, down & Dirty swampy grooves,and Afro-Caraiba poli-ritmos ,performed on mostly organic/acustic instrumentation( outside of the obligatory electric guitar, & electric piano/organ)..... the 2 long "narcotic" tracks, Gris-gris" & "I walk...Splinters" lure you into a trance-like world, where the 2 "danses" evoke a Hoodoo whirling dervish....."WORLD musics " before the frase was coined! And the strictly New Orleans "Mama Roux" is a second line strut! No "blues -influenced" stuff here, Africa comes home on the drum, and not the "blue-note". Rough, ragged & poorly produced, the emotion of the musics shines through like the healing rays of a new day's sun! Dr. John's finest hour- he WAS inna right place at the right time, and gris-gris is the legacy!