Summary.
The most genuine street experience was depicted by Michelle Shocked.
She recorded the humble and fiery Texas Campfire Tapes (1986)
in the spirit of Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger, singing about the issues of
her (punk and post-feminist) generation. Her songwriting peaked with the
electrifying Short Sharp Shocked (1988), but then Sharp began a
stylistic pilgrimage that took her to visit the era of jazz big-bands on
Captain Swing (1989), folk and blues of the early days on
Arkansas Traveler (1992) and gospel (on her unreleased fifth album).
She finally managed to wed her populist passion and her jazz-blues sound
on Kind Hearted Woman (1994), her most poignant work, reminiscent of
John Mellencamp's rural epics, and to synthesize her musical explorations on
the erudite Deep Natural (2002). Despite her tormented biography
and rebellious attitudes, Shocked was fundamentally a collector of sonic
icons a` la Ry Cooder.
Full bio.
(Translated from my original Italian text by ChatGPT and Piero Scaruffi)
A quintessential street musician and sincere activist, Texan Michelle Shocked Johnston was at the forefront of the generation of singer-songwriters that came to prominence in the 1980s, taking advantage of the openness of the new wave era in both mindset and the recording industry.
She was also the most subversive: imprisoned for political disturbances at the 1984 Democratic Convention and again at the Republican one the following year, exiled across Europe and eventually taking refuge in London, she was far from an innocent girl when she recorded the Texas Campfire Tapes (Cooking Vinyl, 1986) live on a cassette recorder, the album that made her famous. The stark folk of My Little Sister and Necktie, more a descendant of Woody Guthrie than of the 1970s singer-songwriters, relied on a poetic and compassionate tone.
On Short Sharp Shocked (Mercury, 1988), Shocked instead worked with a full backing band. The blues-rock of If Love Was A Train, the Dylan-esque ballad Anchorage, the melancholic Memories Of East Texas, and the talking blues of Graffiti Limbo did more than simply recite her lyrics.
Captain Swing (Mercury, 1989) completely abandoned the poses of intellectual narcissism that had earned her magazine covers and revealed her true passion: jazz big bands and Black popular music. The satirical rhythm and blues of God Is A Real Estate Developer, the zydeco played in the style of Little Feat On The Greener Side, and the tuba-driven Dixieland of Must Be Luff marked her shift toward urban musical culture.
Arkansas Traveler (Mercury, 1992) crowned her rise to the pantheon of singer-songwriters with an exceptional cast and a repertoire that had never been so spectacular while still rooted in a tradition she constantly challenged. Borrowing 19th-century fiddle melodies, both white and Black, Shocked and her collaborators retraced the path of the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band and Ry Cooder, but in Come A Long Way Shocked also displayed her pop virtuosity.
Shortly afterward, her career was severely affected by contractual conflicts, as a result of which her gospel album Prayers was never released, and Kind Hearted Woman (Mood Swing, 1994 / Private, 1996) was recorded independently and shelved for two years (the first three songs even date back to a 1993 theatrical work). It was precisely in that almost fatal turmoil that Shocked found her true voice. This is perhaps her masterpiece.
Accompanied only by her Irish friends Fiachna OBraonain and Peter OToole (of the Hothouse Flowers), Shocked crafted her most populist yet most personal work, set in the desolation of rural life, close to the troubled characters of Mellencamps songs. Yet these are mostly chilling melodramas, elevated by the metamorphoses of her voice (Tim Buckleylike jazzed vibrato in the long conceptual recitation of Stillborn, a yodeling roar in the honky-tonk saloon of Eddy).
Thus the agonizing blues of Winter Wheat rises into the most heartbreaking melody of her career, halfway between Nick Cave and Leonard Cohen. Elsewhere Shocked delivers the stunned melancholy of the Cowboy Junkies (Cold Comfort), melts into a tender lullaby (A Child Like Grace), and drifts into painful confessions (Fever Breaks, borrowing the melody from The Polices Roxanne). Rage erupts suddenly in the slashing riffs of Homestead, but it remains only an episode. The albums theme is fatalismthe impossibility of redeeming ones life, the condemnation to an endless hell.
The cadenced choral hymn The Hard Way echoes the existential quadrilles of the previous album.
Mercury Poise (Mercury) is the anthology through which Shocked freed herself from her contract with her former record label.
(Original English text by Piero Scaruffi)
Deep Natural (Mighty Sound, 2002)
may sound like a tribute to the New Orleans sound of the 1960s,
but it is truly a compendium of Shocked's roots:
rhythm'n'blues, jazz, folk and reggae.
In many ways, it connects to the Neville Brothers' Yellow Moon (A&M, 1989),
to Daniel Lanois' Acadie,
to Ry Cooder's early albums,
to Taj Mahal's Giant Step.
At the same time, Joy and the other "religious" tracks set a
"Christian" tone that is almost optimistic. Her colloquial meditations
(Peachfuzz, If Not Here, Go in Peace) have the quality
of church confessions, while the soaring gospel anthems of
Somebody's House is Burning Down and Psalm sound like
sermons of redemption.
Dub Natural (Mighty Sound, 2002) is the remix album, that removes
most of the vocals: what is left sounds like an intriguing cinematic score.
No matter how forgotten by her fans, she had never released a bad album.
Her turn to disappoint came in 2005, when she released not one but three
bad albums:
Don't Ask Don't Tell (2005), a sort of concept about divorce,
Mexican Standoff (2005) and a collection of covers,
Got No Strings (2005).
