They’ve been making records and a name for themselves in Europe, and now they are on an 11 state tour of North America, bringing a grunged out “spaghetti country” sound to places like Nashville and Atlanta, with a no-holds-barred attitude ropin’ ’em up and branding ’em in droves like it was the old west. They are the duo The Beards, from Venice, Italy. “Ahhhh, Venice…”
It’s kinda funny how this world works out. I had actually stumbled on these cats just a couple days before the record arrived for review, and on first listen, I knew they stood out stylistically and had a feeling I would enjoy the rest of their tunes. I wasn’t wrong!
Widmann’s Mansion is a record of the old kind, you know a real record. All the way through it, I can tell I’m listening to the same band. Too many try to cover too much ground, these days, losing the defining “glue” that makes a band a band when it comes studio and tape time. Not these guys!
“Spaghetti Country” now that’s a new genre tag on me, but being a huge fan of the Spaghetti Westerns, I get it. Ya, I really do… Instruments from acoustic guitars and tambourine and percussion to rockin’ grungy electrics and almost zydeco washboard and squeeze box (concertina for the young guys – that’s a small accordion) with growling baritone vocals blend in a way that could have made Clint Eastwood hide behind a cactus.
Starting off with an eerie piano driven track, “Life’s a Long Hard Road,” it moves into a boogie-stomp “Baby Loves To Boogie.” It’s about halfway through this one, I’m thinking it has that great tape sound and live feel of the records from the ’60’s and ’70’s.
Emanuele Marchiori and Massimiliano Magro team up with producer, Aaron ‘Professor Louie’ Hurwitz (The Band, Bob Dylan, Graham Parker) and Miss Marie and Julien Poulson to build the band for the record. Their individual talents merge perfectly for the songs, written and recorded in a week at Villa Widmann in Italy on the Riviera Brenta.
Stomps and rags and beautiful ballads and rock-n-roll and Texas outlaw country styles fill the album, each tune is distinctive but they all fit together in a way that makes me say, “I bet that was a heck of a show up in Nashville a few weeks ago!”
Max Magro’s baritone vocal has a unique quality that he uses to the advantage of the song, no qualms at all with belting it out like The King would have, he switches up an octave to surprise us a few times and even does a convincing Dylan style on a cover of “Like a Rolling Stone.” There’s a bit of that elusive quality of Roy Orbison in his falsetto, too. And it’s all wrapped up in arrangements that remind one of The Doors or The Band with Miss Marie’s backing vocal reminiscent of Donna Godchaux / Grateful Dead to make a top notch record. I’ll be listening to this one for a while!
