Tuesday, 27 August 2013

Zabu - My Coffin's Ready, 1972



French Blues Vocal In English

I have just come across this fine French blues album – though you wouldn’t know it’s French – performed by Lucien Zabuski who used to be the vocalist for Magma, though I think he left before their first release. Not sure; still learning.

For the vocal think Edgar Broughton and you’d have a perfect reference point for the sound in its growl and emotion. The songs are basically a rock blues with some soulful singing, but also generic rather than original – not that this matters at all because that is what you should expect and want if listening to this: and Zabu’s vocal is superb in that style already noted.  

Track five Silent Angel is a delightful exception, a jazz number enlivened by the saxophone playing and Zabu’s more expressive vocal, here sounding like Roger Chapman. The French band is excellent [and if you want the full cast list, check it out here], but it is the sax soloing that plays wonderfully off the voice, though I’m not sure if the lead is Teddy Lasry or Yochk’o Seffer [and there is a Laurent Grangier who plays too], and I like the guitar work woven amongst the saxophone, presumably played by Dominique Frideloux.

Sixth Subversion Blues is another song sticking its head above the rest, a gothic/horror riff [you just recognise it, don’t you?] and the manic shrieks and ringing bell add a further sense of menace – a song that really must be used is any one of the zombie films/series so popular at the moment: The Waking Dead meets Zabu.

The album closes on a punk amalgam of country and rock, Yellow Girl, the opening bluegrass fiddle disappearing as a sound as quickly as it has started. What a tease. 


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