Lennie Gallant, If We Had a Fire

Lennie Gallant, If We Had A Fire

The return of one of our best story tellers

Stephen Pate, NJN Network, Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, Canada, July 25 2009

PEI’s favourite son has returned from the recording studio with 14 new songs on the CD If We Had a Fire. After 30 years, 8 CD’s and numerous performances, I wondered: does he have anything new?

Apparently there is more Lennie Gallant for us to enjoy. After a week of putting the CD through the car, laptop and computer I found myself humming the riff of Dance the Dark Away in traffic. I didn’t have the words but that nifty riff wouldn’t go away.

If you are on PEI this weekend, you can catch Lennie Gallant in concert at
July 25th, Songwriter’s Circle, Harmony House, Hunter River, PEI
July 26th, Rendezvous Rustico, St. Augustine’s, Rustico, PEI

For the balance of his concert bookings, check his official site.

I’ve been reviewing records and CDs for too long to tell you what is good and bad. But I think Lennie’s fans will want to own this CD and he will win new fans to his style of storytelling and music.

Lennie has always been a great painter of people’s lives in his songs. He is more than the self-revelatory songwriter who spins out naval lint ad nauseum. His characters are diverse and well drawn. The stories draw me in. “So then what happened?”

If there is any flaw, it’s Lennie’s knack for soft peddling the words, which is a kind way of saying it gets hard to hear the words in places. A friend said she found the first three songs hard to understand. Of course, the music draws you back in for for repeated listenings.

She was telling me she cried during Tonight I Drive You Home. I thought, what song was that, must have been distracted traffic? While I was waiting outside one night in the rain I picked it in the car player. That is one tough song to listen you. I wanted to cry but guys aren’t supposed to so I suppressed it. It still shakes me to think about it.

The CD is layered and doesn’t reveal itself all at once which keeps it in rotation.

Lennie has a special tender touch in love songs like You Don’t Know How Beautiful You Are and Emily’s Letters .

One day Lennie spun out a story of ghosts who plagued his band long ago and I felt my spine tingle again with Tell Me a Ghost Story.

I’ve heard Before We Sell This Car before and it was an instant hit. This should remind performers they need to play material people can remember which is part of the logical and emotional appeal of music. We connect with melodies, words, rhythms that are buried deep inside and the recognition helps us recollect the emotion.

The backing musicians are a combination of his band mates like Adam Dowling and Sean Kemp and other tasty instrumentalists.

For Lennie’s comments on the album see If We Had A Fire, Lennie Gallant

While the album won’t be in stores until July 24th, you can sample the mp3s and buy them on Amazon.com since June. The CD comes in a fold case with a lyrics booklet. The CD will be available on July 28th and I know Wendy Gilmore in Halifax, NS is working hard to make all that happen on time.

Except where otherwise noted, this work is licensed under a Creative Commons License – NJN Network Inc.