July/August 2005 Issue

Motivational Speaker

Alvin Youngblood Hart. <i>Artemis/Tone-Cool.</i>

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While he’s a master of old-time country blues, Alvin Youngblood Hart is no hard-core purist—the versatile guitarist plays everything from hillbilly laments to ’70s soul to cerebral jams. On the irresistible Motivational Speaker, he embraces heavy rock, drenching the songs with big riffs and joyously flashy solos that never seem excessive. Hart uncorks a soaring instrumental reminiscent of Hendrix at his jazziest on “Shootout on I-55,” launches a blazing electric boogie on “Big Mama’s Door (Might Return),” and detours to Nashville for a twangy cover of country outlaw Johnny Paycheck’s “Meanest Jukebox in Town.” And the eerie “When Can I Change My Clothes” is a masterpiece, with Hart imitating a graveyard spirit, his gritty voice a mixture of anguish and determination.

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It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

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Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

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