CD Review
David Gogo
Live at Deer Lake (Official Bootleg Series Volume I)
Cordova Bay Entertainment Group, Inc. (© 2003, CBR - 0292)
by Jim Angehr
Review date: August 2004
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David Gogo, the still-young blues man from Canada and casualty of major-label contract shenanigans, gives us a live album full of flashy guitar pyrotechnics in Live at Deer Lake. It's a great, rocking album. The question for an album like this, though, is whether or not it is a necessary album. Blues collectors have plenty of guitar-orgy live productions on their shelves—do we need another?
In my opinion, with this kind of album, stellar guitar work is the cover charge; if the guitar doesn't amaze, give the record a pass. For Live at Deer Lake, Gogo's fretwork comes through in spades. He's the complete guitar package: full tone with a pleasing balance of bite and butter (see the opener, the self-penned "Things Are About to Change"), speed to spare ("Louisiana Blues"), and an innate sense of soloing dynamics that serves up the right escalation of tension and release. The two closing tracks of the main set, Magic Sam's " I Feel So Good" and the Willie Dixon chestnut "Hoochie Coochie Man"—hey, a live set with two Muddy Waters songs must be doing something right—are an example of floor-shaking blues that would shake your money maker on a Friday night and hold up to repeated listenings on CD.
However, for any guitar-god album to get my nod, the vocals must sustain my interest. Granting excellent guitar, does the singer keep my attention between the solos? As an example, for all of my respect for Stevie Ray Vaughn, I can't handle his thin pipes for more than a couple of numbers. (You can hear SRV influence on Deer Lake in a track like "Soul Fever," by the way.) Let it be said, then, that Gogo has the goods in the vocal department. He's definitely a blues shouter, but he retains just enough nuance and depth in his delivery to make sure the proceedings stay intriguing. Think a less-overwrought Tom Waits singing blues at higher volume. On the strength of Gogo's singing (again, taking for granted the guitar), this disc gets my recommendation.
There's a disclaimer on the back of Deer Lake that says, "Welcome to the ‘Official Bootleg Series'. We plan to offer David's fans a chance to sample offerings from our archives during down time between studio projects." Here's hoping for more "bootleg" releases from this up-and-comer.
www.davidgogo.org
www.cordovabay.com
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