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| PHIL SHOENFELT & BAND OF HEYSEK MUMBO JUMBO GUMBO |
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| Musicians |
| Phil Shoenfelt |
vocals, guitars |
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| Jan Švihálek |
guitar, vocals, harmonica |
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| Lukáš Kytnar |
drums |
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| Moimir “Bob” Sabolovič |
bass |
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| guest musicians: |
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| Omer Blentic |
keyboards |
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| Kristi Lescinski |
backing vocals |
| Availabilty |
| BANDCAMP |
| Credits |
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Music
written by Phil Shoenfelt (4, 6, 7, 9); Jan Švihálek (2, 3, 5)
and Phil Shoenfelt,Jan Švihálek , Moimir “Bob” Sabolovič and Lukáš
Kytnar (1, 8) Lyrics written by Phil Shoenfelt and Jan Švihálek (1-8); and Phil Shoenfelt (9) Recorded in Mikulov, Czech Republic at the Cox Studio, August 2023 Sound and mastering: Jiri "Topol" Novotny Cover design: Mojmir "Bob" Sabolovic using BIC Photos: Oldrich Sil |
| Press Release |
Gumbo:
a spicy Creole stew containing shellfish or meat, popular in New
Orleans. Mumbo jumbo: meaningless nonsense, in contemporary idiomatic
English. Both expressions – like the Blues itself – are of African
origin and first crossed the Atlantic with the slave ships: “ki ngombo”
for the vegetable okra (“gumbo” by way of Louisiana French); mumbo
jumbo from the Mandrinka word “Maamajomboo”, a masked male dancer who
took part in magic and rituals. Probably nonsense to the average
English slave trader, but for locals the mumbo jumbo man had
supernatural powers.
A few years ago, Band of Heysek made their own epic journey across the Atlantic. They travelled from Brno to north Mississippi and recorded a couple of albums with Hill Country Blues legends R.L. Boyce and Kenny Brown. But for Mumbo Jumbo Gumbo, they stayed closer to home and recorded in Moravia with another Blues aficionado – Prague-based Englishman Phil Shoenfelt. The collaboration began in the summer of 2020, when Phil was invited to play a gig in Brno with the Heyseks as his backing band. More gigs followed and the synergy was so special that the idea was put forward to write some songs together. Via email and Google, Phil and Jan Švihálek collaborated on a set of surreal lyrics. By January 2023, they had enough material to start jamming with drummer Lukáš Kytnar and bassist Moimir “Bob” Sabolovič. Over the course of a single weekend, holed up in Honza’s cottage, they came up with a dozen or so numbers. Most of them were based on music that Phil and Honza had worked on independently. Others were spontaneously improvised, conjured out of the Moravian air as if by magic. By the time they met in August to record at David Kohler’s studio in Mikulov, the songs had taken shape but were by no means finished. What happened during the following three days was something like a miracle. These proto-songs suddenly blossomed into a wide-spectrum sound that takes its influences not only from the Blues, but from Country, Rockabilly, Punk, Post-Punk, Pop, Progressive, Psychedelic and Folk Rock. The punk approach and Blues feeling of the Heysek guys welded with Shoenfelt’s past in Anglo-American post-punk, Psychedelia, Folk and Gothic Blues. It’s an ambitious collection of songs – as if seventy years of a particular strand of popular music had been distilled into one integrated whole. Following the Heysek method, the album was recorded live in the studio with no overdubs and no corrections. There is a “looseness” in the playing – looseness, not sloppiness – that recalls not only the Blues, but American rock from The Band and Neil Young to Wilco and Drive-By Truckers. Not many European bands can catch this American quality, which has antecedents in Gospel, Funk and Swing. Studio maestro Jirka “Topol” Novotný was an integral part of the process, especially at the post-production stage. Keyboard virtuoso Omer Blentić spanned the range from Jerry Lee Lewis to Matthew Fisher, while the incredible backing vocals of Kristi Lescinski gave an authentic American edge to swamp rock numbers like “Monkey Brain” and “Alligator Shoes”. Mumbo Jumbo Gumbo: a spicy stew of magic, music and divine poetic nonsense. |
| Liner Notes |
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Gumbo:
a spicy Creole stew containing shellfish or meat, popular in New
Orleans. Mumbo jumbo: nonsense, in contemporary idiomatic English. Both
expressions are of African origin: “ki ngombo” is Bantu for the
vegetable okra (“gumbo” by way of Louisiana French); mumbo jumbo is
from the Mandrinka word “Maamajomboo”, a masked male dancer who took
part in religious ceremonies and settled domestic disputes. Probably
nonsense to the average English slave trader, but for locals the mumbo
jumbo man had supernatural powers.
Poetry has its origins in the supernatural too. Sometimes it can be so cryptic as to seem nonsensical to the layman. When Honza and I started to collaborate on lyrics, we didn’t worry too much about “making sense”. We wrote emails to each other as a kind of game – random lines and images that we challenged each other to complete. It was great fun, especially when he wrote lines such as: One day the doctor came to examine me/He shone his light right down my throat/Sore as it always is when I get some kind of trouble…Now how the hell should I finish that? I like my lyrics to rhyme, but there aren’t so many juicy words that rhyme with “throat”. “Stoat” maybe. What about “moat” or “coat”? “Croak” would be interesting, especially in a medical context. (“To croak” in idiomatic English means “to die”, and a “croaker” is nineteenth century slang for a doctor. For William Burroughs, “a croaker that writes” was a doctor who could be persuaded to write a morphine script.) Instead, I completed the verse with: I had the feeling that he wanted to gloat, which goes against one’s expectations of how a caring medical professional should behave. Another Honzarian line was: Your throat is stuck and your teeth will soon wobble. The only possible response to that was: I hope he’s out of my dreams for good/And my wobbly teeth won’t go flying out his door. And so it continued, in a surreal vein that reminded me of Blonde On Blonde period Bob Dylan. Great fun, as I say, and surprisingly the lyrics we wrote actually came out meaning something (though it’s not always clear exactly what). Into the stew I also threw a seasoning of images from American popular culture and Delta Blues: 70’s Buicks with whitewall tires; crazy dames and big ol’ mamas; gallons of moonshine and levees breaking; Jack and cigarillos and alligator shoes. We allowed the strange brew to simmer and bubble for a few months then went back into the kitchen and gobbled the whole thing up. Mumbo Jumbo Gumbo: a spicy stew of magic, music and divine poetic nonsense. Phil Shoenfelt |
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