CD Review: Willie Nile – Live from the Streets of New York

Willie Nile is no dummy. Of his nine albums, three of them were recorded live in concert, and the reason why is obvious. His studio recordings may be consistently good and frequently excellent, but as a charismatic, intense live performer, Nile is absolutely unsurpassed. This latest one (also available as a DVD) may or may not be the best of his three live cds, but whatever the case, it’s a blast of state-of-the-art rock songcraft put across with raw guitar power.

 

Nile is an indelibly New York figure. His surreal street scenes evoke a time before luxury condos and Starbucks on every corner, when much of this city was off-limits after dark unless you were looking for drugs or trouble. Recorded at the Mercury Lounge, this show is typical in that Nile and his band are at the absolute top of their game: with the roar of the three guitars onstage, even even the secondary songs are transformed. Longtime John Mellencamp lead player Andy York is his usual sensational self here; Jimmy Vivino also contributes tastefully, even subtly: he’s grown by leaps and bounds since he started playing with Nile. One of the pioneers of 80s janglerock, Nile himself plays with considerable originality, and the three of them together blend into a volcanic guitar orchestra backed by a pummeling yet melodic rhythm section of Brad Albetta (noteworthy producer of Serena Jost and player with Mary Lee’s Corvette,  among others) on bass and Rich Pagano of the Fab Faux on drums.

 

The version of Game of Fools on Nile’s most recent studio cd Streets of NYC is an organ-driven pop hit that sounds a lot like the Wallflowers; this version has tsunami-like power. The amped-up Irish ballad The Day I Saw Bo Diddley in Washington Square holds back just enough for Nile’s defiant, surrealist lyric to cut through. Likewise, Back Home, with its thicket of lyrics is stripped down to just Nile (playing piano here), rhythm section and York on harmonica, rich with terse apprehension. Nile’s signature song Vagabond Moon (the number one song of the year in Finland, 1981) sounds as fresh and triumphant as the day he wrote it, bounding along on Albetta’s booming bassline.  When York jumps in after Vivino’s gentle mandolin intro, the excoriating Best Friends Money Can Buy explodes in a ball of fire and keeps blazing, everyone gleefully singing along. Hard Times in America, the title track to an obscure ep released in the 90s, is reinvented as eerie, electrified delta blues noir: “I wrote this song about, I dunno, a dozen years ago. It’s more true now than when I wrote it,” Nile snarls.

 

Predictably, the album’s centerpiece – also from Streets of NYC - is Cell Phones Ringing in the Pockets of the Dead, the long, incendiary anthem about the Madrid train bombings.  The cover of Police on My Back (on the cd but not the DVD) is a dead ringer for the Clash except with better vocals. The show wraps up on a surprisingly pensive note with Nile playing piano on the Jungleland-esque ballad Streets of New York. It’s tempting to say that if you get one Willie Nile live album, get this one, although the Live in Central Park cd is a feast of guitar jangle and clang (even if the song selection isn’t as good), and Live at the Turning Point is arguably the ballsiest acoustic rock album ever made. The studio stuff – especially Streets of NYC and its predecessor, Beautiful Wreck of the World – is also very much worth seeking out. It may only be August, but this cd is definitely top ten for this year.