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Super Chikan at Whiskey Junction

Filed under: Imported

I've always found Fat Possum Records to be a lot more interesting on paper than disk. Sure, it's fascinating to learn that when T-Model Ford was 11 years old his daddy beat him so bad he lost a testicle. Or that he once did time for stabbing a man to death. Or that T-Model's drummer, Spam, lost several fingertips to a jealous girlfriend wielding a box cutter. Or that one of T-Model's many witty aphorisms is, "Every town shall furnish its own women."

But as for the music that T-Model and Spam create when they're not dead drunk or trying to kill each other? Interesting--for about a half hour. That is, until you realize that every one of these gritty blues numbers sounds pretty much like the one that preceded it. 

Of the Fat Possum albums that I've heard, only one lived up to the hype: James Louis "Super Chikan" Johnson's What You See. This 2000 gem is plenty weird. Super Chikan yodels, clucks, grunts, and screams. He plays a guitar fashioned from a gas can (a "chicantar"). And most of his songs mention chickens at least once. But the album's also funny as hell, and ridiculously catchy. Super Chikan's inspired fusion of blues, country, and R & B manages to bring to mind both Jimmy Rodgers and Howe Gelb.

Super Chikan is in the Twin Cities Saturday night at Whiskey Junction, and--as best I can tell--has managed to avoid getting any press whatsoever. Click here for a Super Chikan Q & A.

Posted by Paul Demko at June 13, 2003 4:27 PM

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