Soul Tub!
Written by Greg Johnson Wednesday, 16 September 2009 17:05
Bookmark with:
The California Honeydrops
TubTone Records
If you’re going to make a splash as a street performer, you have to have at least one of two things going for you: 1 – you have a gimmick to draw people’s attention, or 2 – you’re really good at what you do. In the case of The California Honeydrops, they’re pulling your attention with both angles.
Working in the subway stations of Oakland, California, The Honeydrops first draw you in with the homemade bass made with a broom handle and a 5-gallon plastic bucket. “That ain’t no bucket!,” declares Nansamba Ssensalo on the CD. “It’s a tub. A soul tub!” Whatever she wants to call it, she knows how to handle the simple instrument, drawing more sound from it than you would ever expect. Plus she also handles duties on both the washboard and jug, too.
Ssensalo met band leader Lech Wierzynski while both attended classes at Oberlin College in Ohio. There the two formed a jug band, while neither actually played the right instruments at the time. Ssensalo was actually a concert violist while Wierzinski was a trumpeter. He began taking up the guitar, while she learned both the fiddle and jug and together they started performing older musical styles while blending in forms of New Orleans jazz and work songs.
Moving out to Oakland, they were teamed up with another friend from Oberlin in drummer Ben Malament and started playing in the subways. During this same period, Wierzinski found time to work behind accomplished artists such as Maria Muldaur, Dan Hicks and Jackie Payne & Steve Edmonson. They also hooked up with the well established Bay Area pianist Chris Burns, who had worked extensively with people like Albert Collins, Maria Muldaur and Freddie Hughes. It made for quite a unique and diverse mixture of musical styles, and they seemed to do them all quite well which comes across magnificently on their debut CD, “Soul Tub!”
In concert the band can move easily from a slow blues tune like Johnny Adams “Hell Yes, I Cheated” right into a gospel-inspired Ray Charles tune or New Orleans second line piece like Earl King’s “Mardi Gras In New Orleans.” The same is true on the CD, with finger-snapping tracks like “Miss Louise,” sing-along bits such as “Squeezy Breezy” or the soulful flowing title song, “Soul Tub.” The moods swing easily, with particular attention to the New Orleans flavor drawn by Wierzynski whenever he starts blowing that trumpet.
If you’re looking for a CD that is relaxed, feel good about life and enjoy the moment, The California Honeydrops are the answer you’re looking for. Just plain good old fun, expect nothing less from this quartet who claim they’re not looking to make any money, they just want to play past their bedtime! Hell yeah!
Total Time: 45:02
Miss Louise / Rain / Soul Tub / All You Got To Do / Bye Bye Baby, I’m Gone / Honeydrops Theme / In My Dreams / Squeezy Breezy / Help Me Now / All Night Long / Cry For Me / Soul Tub (Reprise)