SomethingElse Reviews of “Tangled Road” from Blues Bytes on line blues mag!
I’ve only been in Colorado for a little over a year now, but I’m thoroughly impressed by the amount and diversity of great Blues players we have here in the “squar…e” state. One such Bluesman is Dan Treanor, leader of the Afrossippi Band who along with featured singer, Erica Brown, won this year’s Colorado Blues Society’s IBC challenge and just captured third place at the International Blues Challenge in Memphis. I’ve known Dan for several years now and the addition of Erica’s voice to the mix was a stroke of genius. You can hear the result of this collaboration on a rocking disc entitled Tangled Road.
The title cut, written by Dan, is a tune in the vernacular of the old spirituals and features Erica in a classic call and response. Dan kicks the party off with the intro on his Khalam while Erica asks the question, “who’s that walking down a tangled road? Ain’t nobody but me…Lord!” I had a friend who heard Erica’s voice singing this from the speaker’s at Alfred’s and she said, “My God, Kyle, that voice! I had to go inside and see what was going on!” Erica Brown is definitely one of Colorado’s treasures and Dan’s right when he says, “Erica has a world-class voice!”
Dan’s harp provides the introduction on our next cut, “Tell Me Daddy,” another tune written by Dan. Here we find Erica wondering, “Tell me daddy…where did you stay last night? Tell me daddy, cause I really got to know…where did you stay last night?” Obviously he was out late and didn’t make it home, I would hate to be the one facing Erica’s wrath at the door, that’s for sure!
Our tempo slows down considerably as Erica, Dan and the band tackle Toussaint McCall’s classic tune, “Nothing Can Take the Place of You.” “Each day finds me so blue…cause nothing…nothing…takes the place of you!” You can hear the passion and love in Erica’s voice as she laments the loss of this love of her life…”nothing takes the place of you!” Dan’s rocking harp picks up the pace for our next tune, Koko Taylor’s “Ernestine.” Here we find Erica defending her territory and ready to challenge the woman who is after her man. “I told you for the last time….find a man of your own….Ernestine…girl, what you doing you know ain’t right!” Somehow I think Erica will win the battle and successfully kick Ernestine to the curb!
A local bluesman, J.D. Kelly, wrote the song “Dynamite,” and Dan, Erica and the band tackle it next. “Your love’s like fire…the fire get out…come on shake it baby…show me what you got…your love’s like dynamite…if you’re looking for good love…you just might find it!” Tangled Road closes with the Willie Dixon classic, “Wang Dang Doodle,” and the guitar work of Michael Hossler provides the intro to Erica’s vocals, “we going to pitch a ball…down to that union hall…we going to pitch a wang dang doodle…all night long!”
Tangled Road is an excellent representation of the work put in by Dan, the Afrosippi Band and the incomparable Erica Brown. They took Memphis by storm and gained a lot of Blues fans for the “square” state in the process. It was quite the week in Memphis for those of us from Colorado, and we couldn’t be prouder of the performances our IBC entry cranked out. You can grab a copy of this disc on Dan’s website, www.dantreanorband.com, and the energy of the entire disc is amazing. Enjoy!
— Kyle Deibler