While there’s an urge (and a need) for exhaustive retrospection and rarified treasure-hunting, there’s something bluntly elegant about compacting highly specific moments in a longtime artist’s repertoire and offering up oddities. That’s the seven-year itch of this collected Atco/Atlantic singles disc from New Orleans session pianist-turned-solo oddball Mac Rebennack. These singles don’t just happen to represent Dr. John’s commercial nadir (the syncopated “Right Place Wrong Time” was a top-10 hit). This tight package represents Rebennack’s cackling vocals, shambolic guitar playing and mighty rhythmic stride piano runs at their then-strongest peak—that is, until the last decade, where everything he’s done is strong. The dusty funk of “Mos’ Scocious,” the tattered emotive soul of “Me-You=Loneliness,” the hammy jazz of “Such A Night,” the wronged blues of “A Man Of Many Words” (with Eric Clapton and Buddy Guy) and the holy rolling bits of “Well, I’ll Be John Brown” and “I Walk On Gilded Splinters” (parts one and two)” are simply gorgeous.
—A.D. Amorosi
