Taj & Keb' Prove First Album Wasn’t Luck

Keb' Mo' and Taj Mahal launch their second album

Take the blues, add soul and a pinch of folk! And what do you get? Well Americana music of course. True! But more notably you end up with two of the legends of this mixed genre: Taj Mahal and Keb’ Mo’.

The two music masters have reunited to produce a new album Room On The Porch which comes eight years after their first collaboration, TajMo, which would win a Grammy for Best Contemporary Blues Album in 2018. Room On The Porch was released in suitable style on May 23 when the pair launched a 15-venue promotional tour with a concert at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville

“That first album turned out so great that part of me wondered if maybe we just got lucky,” said Keb’. “But when we got back into the studio together, I felt that same magic again, and I realized it wasn’t luck at all.”

Taj was a little more circumspect about their output, reflecting somewhat on how their shared origins influences the distinctive music they produce: “If you take the African imprint out of Western music for the last 500 years, there’s almost nothing left,” he said. “As much as it might feel like we’re touching on all these different genres, the way I see it, we’re just connecting with the music of our ancestors and their influence on what’s happing now.”

Indeed, “what’s happening now” may be an operative phrase. For the album-opening title track -  and album single -  is a feel-good song which is an invitation to love and friendship in times of deep division. Its opening phrase – Hello friend – is very apt. The pair are joined on the porch by Ruby Amanfu, a recording artist who has collaborated with some of the finest in Nashville. Her vocals blend beautifully with Taj as the pair proclaim:

Come on up

There’s room on the porch for everyone

“Room On The Porch” ended up being a co-write between the three. “That song started out as a little guitar piece I use to play to myself after the shows when I was still wired from the stage,” said Taj. I shared it with everybody in the studio, and then Keb’ and Ruby built this whole beautiful song around it.”

Traditional blues oozes on the final track “Rough Time Blues,” which was composed by Jontavious Willis. It seems tailor-made for the  bluesmen, as they vocally intertwine the miseries of modern times:

Somebody give me a quarter

So I can change it out for this old lousy dime

So  I can have fifteen more cents to put on this

Hard time of mine

In between, the opening and closers are eight tracks – five of them original co-writes - which are very much on the same page as that delivered on the Grammy-winning TajMo. And, in  particular, the tonal harmony of their soothing vocals and how the pair use this to inject whatever genre they wish to impose on a particular song.

This is no better illustrated than on the very melodic, somewhat-folky co-write “My Darling My Dear.” Aided by soft instrumentation, the pair criss-cross vocals to deliver silky romantic lines which become infectious and typify how each has impacted on the folk-blues scene over half a century.

Maia Sharp’s 2021 number “Junkyard Dog” is more funky-blues. Taj and Keb' add  a measured keyboard intro which transitions into guitar licks and intrusive percussion. Taj’s composition “Blues’ll Give You Back Your Soul” fits somewhat into the same category, though an inventive Jeff Coffin sax-bridge takes this track nicely into something a little more soulful.

Besides Amanfu,  the only other guest lead-vocalist on the setlist is another Nashville-based artist Wendy Moten. The Memphis-born singer injects her jazz influences on “Better Than Ever,” another funky number which further stretches the genre barriers and very much reflects the distinctive style Taj and Keb’ are seeking.

Taj and Keb’ co-produced the album , which was recorded in Nashville, and are aided and abetted by around a dozen musicians, including sons of each bluesman. But the pair still man most of the guitar-work,  whether it be acoustic, resonator or electric. And just to further emphasise their multi-instrumental skills, you can add banjo, mandolin, harmonica and ukulele to the mix!

For here are two artists – Taj is 83, some ten years older than Keb’ – who have, over many decades, taken all elements of traditional blues and fused them with sounds of various cultures to produce whatever music you wish to define. And that is very Americana.

And so Room On The Porch is delightful Americana as its easy-listening best and, yes, is it just the kind of music best played on a porch!

Paul Cutler

Editor Crossroads – Americana Music Appreciation