The Hidden Treasures of Taj Mahal (4*)

Thursday, 3 January 2013 

Hidden Treasures of Taj Mahal.jpg

Released to celebrate the man’s seventieth birthday and simultaneously launch an expansive archival reissue campaign offering “definitive” editions of Taj Mahal's entire Columbia back catalogue, The Hidden Treasures of Taj Mahal 1969-1973 throws up a  two-disc collection of unreleased material, a disc of studio outtakes and alternate versions recorded between 1969 and 1973 alongside a second disc presenting a live concert from the Royal Albert Hall in London on 18 April 1970. Nothing on the set has previously appeared on an official release.

The studio disc kicks off with four tracks where Taj and Jesse Ed Davis front Jim Dickinson's Dixie Flyers, a lively little bunch of riffage on Chainey Do, one of three takes on Sweet Mama Janisse, a warm vocal on a laid back Yan Nah Mama Loo and an up-tempoTomorrow May Not Be Your Day that would have sat rather nicely on Giant Steps. Very much in the same groove as that album’s Give Your Woman What She Wants...

There’s a heartfelt I Pity The Poor Immigrant with a tasty harp solo that would have sat nicely on The Natch’l Blues,  a reading of Jacob's Ladder that’s rather tasty but probably wouldn’t have fitted anywhere convenient and a brassier take on Ain’t Gwine Whistle Dixie (Any Mo') that doesn’t work as well as the cut that kicks off Giant Steps, but maybe that’s long term familiarity kicking in although the horns do deliver a rather charming groove. 

There’s more than a touch of Ain’t Nobody Going to Steal My Jellyroll about the beginning of the Woodstock version of Sweet Mama Janisse from January 1971 and a rather interesting lead in to You Ain’t No Streetwalker, Honey But I Do Love The Way You Strut Your Stuff where Taj coaches the studio band, scatting out the melody. It must have worked, because once they’re locked into the groove they carry the track past the fifteen minute mark. For mine, the best track out of the studio selections and several leagues ahead of the rather perfunctory Good Morning Little School Girl that follows, though the improvised lyrics towards the end do a little to rectify the situation.

Some tasty banjo picking kicks off the nine-and-a-half-minute Shady Grove though things start to drift towards the end and the harmonica reading of People Get Ready that appears under the title of Butter would seem to be a nod towards the late, great Paul Butterfield. A low key but tasty way to wind up the studio disk.

Disc two, recorded at the Royal Albert Hall in 1970 with Taj opening for Johnny Winter and Santana, has this listener scratching his head and wondering why we haven’t heard this before. Well, I guess the answer is that someone in the record label decided The Real Thing was enough of that sort of thing, and whoever it was may also have decided that the between-songs banter was recorded too low (which it is) but from  the time Taj starts an a cappella Runnin’ By The Riverside and a one man, one guitar take on John, Ain't It Hard he has the audience more or less eating out of his hand. 

Once he’s got his band (Jesse Ed Davis, guitar; John Simon, piano, Bill Rich, bass and James Karsten, drums) out on stage and told a story about what’s coming up Sweet Mama Janisse slinks into swinging funk and while there’s nothing intrinsically new about the harp-driven Big Fat, there’s nothing wrong with swinging blues as far as this listener is concerned. Tasteful, gritty blues is always welcome in these parts.

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© Ian Hughes 2012