Reviews
Review: Los Angeles Times, August 11, 1995
Far From the Real World
Releases: Quealy's Show of Maturity
Jim Quealy offers the voice of experience
|
 |
***
FAR FROM THE REAL WORLD
Mudfram Records |
Mike Boehm, Los Angeles Times
Most of the new rock music that gets rewarded with publicity and record contracts is the work of players in their 20s. Records like this self-financed CD, from Quealy, a 41-year-old, who has been playing as a part-timer in Orange County cover bars over the past decade while raising a family, suggest that room also needs to be made for some older hands.
The Dozen songs on "Far From the Real World" are suffused with a mature vision that comes from doing hard time in the real world. Only somebody who has stood on the peaks and fallen in the ditches, smelled the bouquets and been scratched by the thorns could make songs about relationships ring as true as Quealy does here.
What comes through is a sensibility experienced enough to know what's important, open-hearted enough not to have been dulled or hardened by life's heavy weather,and wise enough not to claim to have final answers to big questions.
Not that Quealy shirks big questions: "See Me Now," a loving ballad to a dead parent, probes deeply into the thorny nature of legacies handed down through generations, observing how they can simultaneously comfort and sustain the lives
of the legatees.
In "Truth," with its sunny tint of reggae and "If My Dreams Were Movies," a tense, spiny rocker a la Dire Straits. Quealy's subject is the human reluctance to be seen in the severe light of naked honesty. The tone isn't the easy indictment of the post-adolescent who thinks in absolutes, but the chastened humbled one of a writer who has seen what can happen when our choices grow murky. Quealy's pithy couplets in "Truth" crystallize a lot of human behavior: You can be favorite man of the year. You can always tell'em what they want to hear. Never expose what might weaken your stance. Lengthen your nose, increase your chance...
The writing isn't always that sharp, lyrically. Quealy has his mannered or overly abstract moments. But his melodies and arrangements which show the influence of such masters as Van Morrison and Smokey Robinson, are consistently strong, and his voice, a husky but pliant tenor that sounds like a grittier Kenny Loggins, never fails to hit home emotionally .
One of the album's strengths is its lovely romantic balladry, but what makes the love songs memorable is the way Quealy injects a twist of doubt and difficulty--in short, reality--into even a glowing tribute like "The Way You Look."
When he gives a pep talk about following dreams ("It Matters to You") or persevering in love ("Night After Night"), his encouraging words gain weight from the note of struggle and hard-won experience in his voice.
The songs get the support they deserve from Quealy's band of regular players, augmented by Laguna Beach studio aces, Steve Wood, who produced and played organ, and Mike Hamilton, who dabs on many a sweetly crying, Lindley-esque slide guitar solo.
|
Review: Los Angeles Times , May 3, 1997
Songs From the Stoop
Visiting a Model Neighborhood
Pop Album Review: The melodic new album
from Jim Quealy roams between roots-rock, folk,
country and rock 'n' roll .
|
 |
***
JIM QUEALY & THE NOISY NEIGHBORS
"Songs From the Stoop"
Mudfram Records
|
John Roos, LA Times
The cover photo for Jim Quealy's new album captures the singer-songwriter seated on his front-porch steps, blowing his harmonica. It's a perfect snapshot because Quealy projects the sense that he enjoys making music so much that he could play happily all by his lonesome.
Fortunately for fans, though, the Rancho Santa Margarita resident got a little help from his friends "The Noisy Neighbors," on this, his second album. The follow-up to his impressive 1995 debut album, "From the Real World," is a winning 10-song collectio n of heartfelt songs, played by a tight, hard-working ensemble, that shows no signs of sophomore slump.
At the heart of the seven-piece band's sound is Quealy's expressive grainy vocals and a melodic, freewheeling style that roams between roots-rock, folk, country and rock 'n' roll. The players are equally strong whether revving it up for such rockers as "Design Yourself a Love" and "Life Goes On" or slowing it down for the concluding, piano-based ballad "Just Walked Away."
As a Lyricist, the 43-year-old Quealy offers a voice smarting from struggle and pain, yet hopeful for love and redemption. He's willing to delve into the complexities of the human experience and brings an insightful, seasoned edge to the material.
Consider the way Quealy examines paths of desperation that lead to far different destinations. In one number, the somber "Just Walked Away," a woman finally walks out on her husband because he's unwilling to be a responsible family man.
The engrossing "Man From Stanville" goes one disturbing step further. Here, a woman plots to kill a "selfish and cruel" husband for his money. She hires a hit man, and sometime after he commits the dirty deed, she falls in love with another man who only has money on his mind. Her fate is sealed when Quealy dedpans: "He knew a man in Stanville / Who could make it look like suicide."
Still, Quealy doesn't just wallow in darkness; he embraces the good in life as well. The mood brightens considerably in "These Two Lives" which celebrates an enduring love that triumphs over numerous obstacles. He rejoices: "They put two lives together / From two lives alone."
Standing out among the backing musicians is pedal steel guitarist and Dobro player, Greg Leisz. The Fullerton-based string ace, known for his solid work with Dave Alvin, Matthew Sweet, k.d. lang and Jimmie Dale Gilmore, adds his distinctive, folksy touch to the cinematic "Man in Stanville" and Walkin' Tall," which effectively exposes one cowboy's vulnerability.
Sitting for a spell with these noisy neighbors is quite rejuvenating. |
|
|
