Albums

Fresh Evidence

Produced by Rory Gallagher.
All songs by Rory Gallagher except 'Empire State Express' by
Eddie 'Son' House.

1. 'Kid' Gloves
2. The King of Zydeco (To: Clifton Chenier)
3. Middle Name
4. Alexis (instrumental)
5. Empire State Express (acoustic)
6. Ghost Blues
7. Heaven's Gate
8. The Loop (instrumental)
9. Walkin Wounded
10. Slumming Angel

Rory Gallagher: vocals; electric and acoustic guitars; dulcimer; electric
sitar; mandola.
Gerry McAvoy: bass guitar.
Brendan O'Neil: drums
Mark Feltham: harmonica
Geraint Watkins: accordion
John Cooke: keyboards
Lou Martin: piano
John Earle: tenor sax; baritone sax
Ray Beavis: tenor sax
Dick Hanson: trumpet

David Sinclair (Q, July, 1990) commented: "Gallagher's neurotic attention
to detail has paid off and Fresh Evidence is a considered and varied
collection without an ounce of spare flesh on its wiry frame.  On two
tracks in particular - Middle Name and Heaven's Gate - he solos with
whiplash severity and taut economy against smouldering, minimalist
backdrops that belie the long months of effort that went into the making
of the finished article."
Rory himself spoke about some of the tracks on
Fresh Evidence as follows:  "The topics of my songs are everything from
cinema-type tunes, like 'Kid' Gloves, where it's a boxer in trouble...I'm
inspired a lot by crime fiction.  King of Zydeco is about a road movie.
Some guy gets totally fed up with the big city, and wants to hit this
musical juke-joint and see someone like Clifton Chenier playing, away from
commercial pressures..." (as interviewed by Vivian Campbell, Guitar,
August, 1991).  And as interviewed by Jas Obrecht (Guitar Player, June,
1991): " 'Empire State Express', for instance, was done in one take on
purpose. I do it close enough to Son House's style, but to sing it in the
tempo, I had to slightly adjust the rhythm. It's a great but very
overlooked song in open G tuning [D G D G B D, very low to high]. 'Ghost
Blues' is quite traditional in its approach with the National; it's also
tuned to open G.  The guitar in 'Middle Name' is more like a Slim Harpo
record, so there are all kinds of references. Besides a few rock tracks,
the rest are very much in the blues field. The album before, Defender,
had a lot of blues elements as well, but it was more of a rock production,
whereas with this new one we didn't overdo the compression or the cleaning
up. We left it fairly wooly and casual, which suits the songs..."

Releases

1990 Capo Records CAPO CD 14 (CD)

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