CONCERT REVIEWS / ALBUM REVIEWS / JOHN BOUTTE / THE BAND

Sing Out!
http://www.singout.org/
Summer 2003

John Boutté & Uptown Okra
Carry Me Home

John Boutté is from a family of soul and jazz singers, and was recently voted the best male vocalist in New Orleans. Uptown Okra is a bluegrass quartet. Together, they have made one of the most exciting folk-related records of the year. Boutté is a phenomenal singer who invites immediate comparison to Sam Cooke, but with the humor and Caribbean swing unique to New Orleans. He would be striking in front of a basic r&b outfit, but is even more so with the stripped-down acoustic backing he receives here. Uptown Okra stays out of his way, while giving him solid support that fits the album's r&b-derived cuts as comfortably as the classic bluegrass and country numbers. There is no feel of self-conscious "fusion." The mix is entirely natural, whether on a lilting "Blue Moon of Kentucky" or the rambunctious recap of Huey "Piano" Smith's "Coo Coo Over You" that opens the disc. The song selection throughout is quirky, but perfectly suits the talents of the performers. There are two songs from the New Orleans soul-bluesman Earl King, several Gospel numbers, the honky-tonk classic "Freeborn Man," and a nice, easy reading of Steve Goodman's "City of New Orleans." Everybody is clearly having fun, especially on the wry "I'm a Cowboy," an obscure composition by the pioneering jazz guitarist Danny Barker. What this album is doing on a self-produced label rather than somewhere like Rounder or Sugar Hill is a mystery; it deserves to be distributed all over the damn place. Boutté is one of America's great singers, and New Orleans's little-known treasures, and this album conveys all the virtuosity, excitement, and humor of his live shows.
-Elijah Wald

Gambit Weekly
http://bestofneworleans.com
May 27, 2003

John Boutté & Uptown Okra
Carry Me Home

It's an unlikely partnership: a country-flavored string and bluegrass band fronted by a jazz and gospel singer. But the union of New Orleans acoustic torchbearers Uptown Okra with soul serenader John Boutté is a winning musical marriage -opposites attracting and building a bond built on intuition and communication.
Both entities have superb musical tastes; evident in the diverse covers they've chosen for Carry Me Home, their first full-length album together. How's this for American music: Huey "Piano" Smith's "Coo Coo Over You," Steve Goodman's "City of New Orleans," Bill Monroe's "Blue Moon of Kentucky" and Danny Barker's "I'm a Cowboy," to name a few. "No Hiding Place" and "Freeborn Man" are spirited hoedowns, with guitarist Brian Siegel and mandolinist Nick Backer picking out clean lines, and Sam Price's standup bass providing a warm bottom end throughout the album. Boutté's always-amazing multi-octave vocals -with his trademark slight rasp- provide just the right amount of grit to the material.
Carry Me Home's defining performances are a heartfelt reading of Earl King's "Let's Make a Better World," and a stirring gospel melody of "Amazing Grace," "Get in Line Brother," "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot" and "I Saw the Light" that closes the album. This is feel-good, uplifting music played expertly and honestly, without pretense. Hallelujah.
-Scott Jordan

TOM JACKSON RADIO
http://www.tomjacksonradio.com
January 2004

The 10 Best Lousiana CDs of 2003
John Boutté & Uptown Okra: Carry Me Home: (Independent)

OFFBEAT
http://www.offbeat.com
June 2003

The Top 50 Louisiana CDs of 2003
Jazz Fest 2003 Top 20 Records
John Boutté & Uptown Okra: Carry Me Home: (Independent)

On paper, it looks like a joke. Maybe a one-off, let's just do it for kicks
kind of pairing. But in reality, the seemingly disparate sounds of string
band upstarts Uptown Okra and the gospel/R&B vocal cords of John Boutté
find a melodious middle ground. In fact, the two may have more in common
than they seem. Other than singing about coal mining and killing that
sonofabitch Billy Joe who stole my girl, the biggest theme in bluegrass is
God. John Boutté may sing a variety of styles, but always sounds most
comfortable in the hallowed halls of gospel music. So there it is. A match
made in heaven. Uptown Okra's debut album, Potluck Dinner, highlighted
their impressive picking, with Boutté's voice a mere guest spot. This time
around, Carry Me Home finds the singer way out in front where he should be.
The song selection on the record is intriguing. Instead of alternating
between straight-up bluegrass tunes and purist arrangements of R&B covers,
Boutté and his string fellows inject an urban groove into the Bill Monroe
tunes while transplanting Crescent City standards like Earl King's "Let's
Make a Better World" to the hills of Appalachia. The blending is such that
a new genre is created, call it soulgrass or maybe New Orleans R&BG.
Boutté's voice is commanding, bringing grit and passion to mountain
standards like "In the Pines" and "Blue Moon of Kentucky." It's also
refreshing to hear R&B classics like Huey Piano Smith's "Coo Coo Over You"
given a mandolin makeover. Throughout, the playing is top-shelf, but
sometimes gets lost amidst the raspy shout of Boutté. It is rare that the
players get to stretch out and start to burn on their own. With any other
group this could be a letdown, but when the guitars and mandolins are
playing second fiddle to the voice of the great John Boutté, it's more
than just musical generosity. It's just plain smart.
-Christopher Blagg

The Times-Picayune
http://www.nola.com
April 12, 2002

Uptown Okra
Potluck Dinner

For their debut, Potluck Dinner, Backer and the other original members wanted to document Uptown Okra in its pre-Boutté incarnation. The band first came together around a series of Uptown potluck dinners several years ago. Backer, banjo player Steve Kierniesky and guitarist Brian Siegel all attended Tulane; upright bassist Sam Price and drummer Danny Devillier were friends from Uptown. Backer grew up in Virginia bluegrass country as a fan of stringed instruments and acoustic music. In New Orleans, he quickly fell under the spell of New Orleans funk and rhythm & blues. He and his new bandmates resolved to combine the two, cooking up acoustic bluegrass arrangements of "Junco Partner" and other songs by James Booker, the late great New Orleans piano wizard. They dubbed their hybrid "GumboGrass."

On Potluck Dinner, they range from bluegrass to Latin music -- Backer and Kierniesky studied abroad in Spanish-speaking countries -- with stops in New Orleans, both lyrically and musically. The Kierniesky title-song "Potluck Dinner" rejects the sugarcoated New Orleans of tourist brochures in favor of a more realistic, street-level look at Big Easy life. The narrator's bike is stolen, a friend falls out of Audubon Park's massive "Tree of Life," and the "crack-head" neighbors are causing a scene/cursing and swinging a 2x4." Meanwhile, "over at the Fly, the river runs high, polluted water rushes by." There are references to the Saturn Bar and "pig tails selling at a dollar a pound," all set to a lickety-split mandolin and banjo romp.
Saxophonist Tim Green, pedal steel guitarist Dave Easley, fiddler Gina Forsyth, percussionist Michael Skinkus, trombonist Craig Klein and harmonica player Smoky Greenwell all make guest appearances.
-Keith Spera

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