Keb Mo Peace...Back by Popular Demand

Featured in Michael Fremer's Heavy Rotation in the March 2011 & September 2010 Issue of Stereophile! Pressed at Pallas in Germany!
What began as a few protest songs recorded by Keb' Mo' in response to the war in Iraq turned into 2004's Peace...Back By Popular Demand, a 10-pack of tunes about hope and freedom. Amazingly completing this product in a month's time, Keb' Mo' managed to rustle up an interesting array of (mostly) covers. With his rich vocals and laid-back phrasing, the Los Angeles native shines on a bubbly reading of Donny Hathaway's "Someday We'll All Be Free," takes a crackling walk through McFadden and Whitehead's "Wake Up Everybody" and strips Dylan's "The Times They Are A-Changin'" down to an acoustic piano duet. Unusual arrangements abound, whether it's the vocals fed through an echo chamber that defines Mo's version of Marvin Gaye's "What's Happening Brother" or the country-blues romp through Nick Lowe's "(What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love and Understanding" that's rendered with a healthy smattering of mandolin and fiddle.
"Peace...Back by Popular Demand finds Keb' Mo' covering nine classic protest and peace songs from the 1960s and early '70s, and what is immediately apparent is how well these songs translate forward into the current political milieu. This is an album where the songs themselves are the stars, and Keb' Mo' wisely takes a low-key and measured vocal approach to each of them, letting the messages take hold over light soul-jazz backings, with just enough funk in the horn charts to give the arrangements some push. It's hard to argue with the song selection, but as an interpreter, Mo' seldom makes any of these tracks his own, and behind each stands the ghostly but clear memory of the original version. Obviously Mo' isn't trying to top the Hit Parade with anything here, and his effort to bring these important songs into a new light is laudable. Peace...Back by Popular Demand is not a major album, but it does have some major things to say, or re-say, in this case, and it serves as a reminder that every era could use (and deserves) some peace." - Steve Leggett/AMG
"[T]he album lends itself beautifully to the analogue medium because it’s just so damned rich: perfectly-recorded piano; fluid guitar, Dobro and bass; Keb’ Mo’s textured vocals... So good is Pure Pleasure’s transfer that it can now serve as my favourite ‘demo disc’... One of the nicest records you’ll ever hear, sonically and spiritually." - Ken Kessler, Hi-Fi News, Sound Quality Rating: 93%

Features:

• 180g Vinyl
• Pressed at Pallas in Germany
• Re-mastering by Ray Staff at Air Mastering, Lyndhurst Hall, London
• Limited Edition

Musicians:

• Keb Mo, guitar, dobro
• James Harrah, guitar
• Jeff Paris, Hammond organ, electric piano, keyboards, acoustic piano
• Reggie McBride, bass
• Stephen Ferrone, drums
• Paulinho da Costa, percussion
• Lon Price, saxophone
• Brian Schwartoz, trumpet, flugelhorn
• Nicholas Lane, trombone
• Nikka Costa, scat vocal (1,3)
• Philip Ingram, backing vocals
• Will Wheaton, backing vocals

Selections:

Side A
1. For What It's Worth
2. Wake Up Everybody
3. People Got To Be Free
4. Talk
5. What's Happening Brother
Side B
1. The Times They Are a Changin'
2. Get Together
3. Someday We'll All Be Free
4. (What's So Funny 'Bout0 Peace, Love and Understanding
5. Imagine