Long time friends/fans of Dan Stuart should get the reference to Marlowe Billings in his new album title. In the mid 80’s, I saw Dan as the great American novelist of our generation via his songs on Gravity Talks and Gas Food Lodging – I met him briefly ’85 in New York and he was brash and obnoxious. We butted heads a few years later over dumb shit and a bit after that, we turned that into our own private musical joke via his cameo on one of my solo LPs. Around that time, I met a new and improved Dan, a true gentleman and I was pleased and honored to release his first two post Green on Red albums in Europe. This new album sees Dan channel some really bad personal shit (and no, it wasn’t drugs or booze) into one of the strongest albums of his career. It’s a UK release, so Europeans should find it easily, but Americans may need to dig around a bit. Do whatever you gotta do, however you need to do it, to listen to this, if Dan’s songs ever moved you in anyway in the past, this record will move your gypsy soul, just like the days of old.
– Pat Thomas is the author of the recently released work, Listen, Whitey! The Sights and Sounds of Black Power 1965-1975. The companion disc for the book has been named one of the ten best CDs of 2012 by Time magazine.
