Mary
Lee's Corvette
Blood
on the Tracks: Recorded Live at Arlene Grocery in
New York City
Street
Date: August 13, 2002 BRN-CD-132
When Mary Lee Kortes cut
live-to-two-track debut disc, Mary Lee's Corvette,
in 1997, she had only planned to create something
homegrown to sell at gigs. But some key taste-makers
thought otherwise. Timothy White, editor-in-chief
of Billboard, declared it one of the Top Ten albums
of the year. WFMU deejay The Hound called Mary Lee
"the 21st Century version of Hal David, Burt
Bacharach, and Dionne Warwick wrapped up in one
svelte package." When music director Bruce
Warren of influential National Public Radio station
WXPN in Philadelphia decided to play a few cuts,
the response from listeners was instantaneous, as
they called in to demand, "Where can we find
this record?"
That's the same question
internet-savvy fans put to Mary Lee after she and
her band, Mary Lee's Corvette, put on a one-evening-only
rendition of Bob Dylan's Blood on the Tracks in
its entirety last fall. This was going to be her
contribution to a series of "classic album
nights" that various local bands had participated
in at Arlene's Grocery on Manhattan's Lower East
Side, events that were more than just sets of casual
covers, but carefully constructed performances of
cover albums. She admits that she readily agreed
to the gig - and then the magnitude of the enterprise
hit her.
Mary Lee never intended to
put out the results of that sometimes scary, ultimately
exhilarating undertaking on a CD. In fact, as she
explains in the liner notes she wrote, Mary Lee
wasn't even sure she really wanted to go through
with the gig once she started rehearsing for it.
But she couldn't really back down from such a challenge.
Mary Lee rose to the occasion so memorably that
fans who weren't there clamored for a chance to
hear what she'd done. Those who were wanted to hear
it again. Luckily, there was a tape rolling during
the entire gig.
As Mary Lee puts it in her
liner notes, "I burned some CDs at home and
sent one to Vin Scelsa, one to Billboard magazine,
and one to Dylancoveralbums.com. Then one morning
I turned on my computer, went online, and had requests
from Sweden, Germany, and California for copies
of this 'record.' And they kept coming."
The Mary Lee's Corvette version
of Blood on the Tracks is more an exploration than
a mere tribute to what was arguably the best of
Bob Dylan's recordings from the seventies. Dylan
had written riveting, action-packed, story songs,
bittersweet romantic travelogues that took his weather-beaten
but still yearning characters from New Orleans to
Tangiers, from memory to reality, from uncertainty
to epiphany. The songs are full of dramatic twists
and turns, and stuffed with words, all of them evocative.
Faced with the daunting task of recreating this
remarkable album track by track on stage, Mary Lee
explains, "These questions immediately presented
themselves: How do you sing a Bob Dylan song in
a way that anyone should ever bother listening to?
How do you sing it right without imitating him?
How do you make it your own? And, of course, why
should you?"
During that late, rainy night
on Stanton Street, Mary Lee found her answers -
and a way to honor Dylan's artistry while injecting
a significant part of herself into the mix. As she
writes, "It's a gift to sing these songs, pure
and simple." Accompanying her were Andy York
on guitar, harmonica, and occasional background
vocals; Rod Hohl on acoustic guitar; Brad Albetta
on bass; Andy Burton on piano and organ; and Diego
Voglino on drums. Midway through the set, she asked
if any audience member wanted to have a go at a
few of the many verses of "Lily, Rosemary,
and the Jack of Hearts." The guy who was brave
enough to join her --- whose name Mary Lee never
quite caught -- was game, but all he could really
bring to the epic song, besides a remarkable retention
of the words, was a kind of comic relief midway
through the show. It becomes clear at that point
how much focus, intensity, and, most importantly,
soulfulness Mary Lee brought to her performance.
Bob Dylan first made his
mark in the Greenwich Village folk clubs along Bleecker
Street that thrived there during the mid-sixties.
Mary Lee found her own niche a little farther east
on the Lower East Side. Her real-life roots, however,
remain way west, in Whitefish, Montana, where she
was raised, the daughter of a drive-in movie theater
operator. It was there that she first discovered
how well her voice and a guitar went together: "I
met this guy playing guitar behind the high school
and this voice popped out of me like a disembodied
spirit. And it just won't stop."
Although she sang with a
variety of bands in the west and the Midwest, she
wasn't convinced she'd remain a musician when she
finally hit the big city. She figured she'd become
a book editor. But her fellow musicians, along with
other fans, weren't about to let that happen. Early
on, Amy Grant cut a version of Mary Lee's "Everywhere
I Go" and it went Top 40 on the Adult Contemporary
charts. Freedy Johnston invited Mary Lee to sing
back-up with him in the studio. And she began to
build a fan base of her own as a singer-songwriter.
When she released her second
album, True Lovers of Adventure, in 1999, USA Today
declared, "The songs reveal a wide-ranging
musical intelligence matched by smart lyrics."
Dan Aquilante of the New York Post asserted, "Newcomer
Mary Lee Kortes, front woman for Mary Lee's Corvette,
has one of the most compelling voices in modern
rock." Entertainment Weekly praised her "lovely,
nuanced voice and deft storytelling."
Fans can rest assured that
there's more of Mary Lee's own material to look
forward to: this summer she'll start to record a
new batch of already stellar songs she's been road-testing
over the last year. And the many who regret missing
the original Blood on the Tracks event will have
the chance to hear those songs live once again.
Mary Lee has already made plans to reprise the entire
set on tour this summer. But there's no need to
wait for her to come to your town - though you can
almost be guaranteed she will -- because all the
emotion, excitement, and inventiveness of that one-night
stand are available right now on this CD.
For more information please
phone Carla Sacks or Liz Campanile at Sacks &
Co., 212.741.1000. liz@sacksco.com
or carla@sacksco.com
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