CHET O’KEEFE – Because Of You (Scarlet SR036CD)

Because Of YouOriginally released two years ago in digital only format, the dusty-voiced Washington singer-songwriter’s third album, Because Of You,  finally gets a full physical release, two of the ten songs being posthumous co-writers with the late Blaze Foley. The first of these, the title track, a slow march dirge featuring occasional bursts of moody electric guitar, is about someone haunted by memories of a past lover, the second being the mid-tempo Tex-Mex flavoured ‘Goin’ Downtown’, O’Keefe’s tapped guitar box percussion accompanying a world weary vocal about trying to escape the blues.

The remaining numbers are all either self-penned or co-writes, several of which wear their influences quite openly. The album’s final cut, ‘Talking Kerrville Blues’, a playful recollection of travelling 900 miles to play two songs at the famous country festival, is set to pretty much the same tune as Johnny Cash’s ‘A Boy Named Sue’, and with the same easy spoken delivery, although it does slip into Guy Clark on occasions, while the equally light-hearted ‘Star Café’ , an ode to Nashville, borrows its melody from ‘Desolation Row’ as he sings about an imagined diner staffed by the likes of Tanya Tucker, Garth Brooks, Vasser Clements, Gretchen Wilson and assorted Hanks, while also nodding to those who, like Lefty Frizell and Jerry Reed, have moved on. You’ll hear Dylan elsewhere too, though Clark is perhaps the strongest influence on O’Keefe’s style and delivery, which is an observation rather than a criticism.

Relationships, lost or found, provide the bulk of the subject matter, kicking off with the slow ticking rhythm of the downcast ‘Not Drunk Yet’ with its conflicting feelings that come with missing someone while trying to stay strong. A more positive note is struck on the waltzing and part-spoken ‘True Love’, the story of Janis, “a big girl with three kids”, and Jimmy, a widow who “wanted a woman to hold”, who get together through Craig’s List, romance sparking in a bar to the backdrop of a band playing Elvis Presley tunes and blossoming into marriage and two more kids.

His playful side is also evident on the frisky talking blues ‘High Tech(nology)’, a number reminiscent in feel of Clark’s ‘Home Grown Tomatoes’, as he sings about being a bumpkin DIY expert who fix anything from a broken muffler to a cat stuck up in a tree. Likewise on ‘Drinkin’ Day’, another slow guitar tapping number that turns the usual line about drinking to forget when your woman leaves on its head, the singer instead turning to the bottle because she’s come back. You could hear Jimmy Buffett doing this.

The first of the co-writes, with album collaborators Thomm Jutz, Jon Weisberger and Kim Richey (who provides backing vocals), is the slow, wistful ‘Oh Angel’, a song of thanks for emotional rescue as he sings “When I look homeward, you’re what I see…a light shining all around me.” The other is the album’s remaining track, ‘Blue Martin’, a song about a Noah-like flood with the titular bird singing at the window pane a reminder that, whatever comes, nature endures “whether we’re here or whether we’re gone”, but also an ode to the uplifting power of music to get you through the storms of life. A copy of O’Keefe’s album could it for you.

Mike Davies

‘Talking Kerrville Blues’ – live in Kerrville: