Reviewed by Paul J Zickler
Released: September 25 1981 Gary Holton And Casino Steel Gary Holton And Casino Steel Genre: Aged English Country Cheese Rating: 3.25 out of 5 Highlights: Ruby (Don’t Take Your Love To Town) Goodnight Irene Good Ol’ Gary Jimmy Brown Sometimes it’s easy to judge an album by its cover. Gary Holton & Casino Steel features a couple of glammy boys in leather, denim and matching headbands cozying up to a bar, with a massively coiffed 80’s girl leaning provocatively over one of them. The back cover features credits for both “stylist” and “hair.” Cheesy, right? Or should we judge this one not by its cover, but by its covers? Six of the album’s ten songs were written by or for other artists: I’ll Find it Where I Can (Waylon Jennings), Runaway (Del Shannon), Thinking of You (Australian country singer Lee Conway), Ruby Don’t Take Your Love to Town (Kenny Rogers), Almost Persuaded (David Houston and every 60’s country singer), and Goodnight Irene (Lead Belly and every folk singer ever). That’s quite a list. What of the originals? Well, two of the titles include the lead singer’s name. Gary’s Song is a paean to days gone by: “There ain’t no superman / Just dirty films and disco dives / But no one seems to care anymore.” Good Ol’ Gary wonders what will happen when he’s gone: “An empty barroom, broken hearts and lonely women / Things won’t be the same without old me / An empty chair and table by the jukebox / And sad sad country songs by Jerry Lee.” I guess it’s important to actually listen to an album if you’re going to review it. What does this sound like? Imagine a snotty voiced English glam singer accompanied by Scandinavian country studio musicians AND a symphony orchestra. Yes, it’s just as messy and weird as that combination implies. The question I kept asking myself was “Is this cheesy and dumb in a fun way, or in an annoying way?” It’s such a fine line. Runaway definitely starts in annoying territory with its punky, recited vocals. But where the expected organ solo should be, the strings take over. Holton doubles down on the cheese by announcing, “Ladies and gentlemen, the orchestra! Who needs a Moog?” By the end he’s yelling “Run run run away. Go on, just run away. See if I care. Stupid little strumpet.” I had to chuckle at that. So maybe more fun than annoying? Goodnight Irene opens with a rock riff, but quickly adds country steel guitar and folky harmony vocals. I don’t think this verse is in the original version: “Sometimes I drink in MIssissippi / Sometimes I drink in Tennessee / Sometimes I get drunk in Louisiana / Anywhere I go, the women sure make a fool out of me.” By the end, a honky tonk piano is blasting out some high pitched chords, and Gary is wailing “Sweet dreams, sweet dreams Irene!” I’m quickly being won over to the fun side. Almost Persuaded is the closest thing to a normal arrangement here, building from quiet bass and steel guitar to big orchestral and choral swells, then dropping to a whisper at the end. Unfortunately it’s marred by really bad drumming and Holton’s misguided attempt to imitate the song’s female character. Still, when all those guitars kick in and the bass rumbles under that huge final chorus, I’m almost persuaded to like the song. Almost, but not quite. And then there’s the Kenny Rogers cover. It opens with that trademark country drum pattern, followed by drunken-sounding vocals that stretch the opening line until it almost breaks. Holton changes “crazy Asian war” to “crazy Irish war,” giving the song an unexpected poignance. But then the coda is him yelling “For God’s sake, turn around! Ruby? Ruby? Come back.” Is that funny? Is it sad? Can it be both? Sometimes it helps to get some background info on the artist. Casino Steel was actually the nom de plume of keyboardist Stein Groven, a much traveled musical artist, recently inducted into the Norwegian Rock Hall of Fame. He put together the other musicians on the album, including the Trondheim Symphony Orchestra, wrote or co-wrote the original songs, and did the arrangements. Gary Holton was a British singer/songwriter, front man for the Heavy Metal Kids, an early 70’s glam outfit named not after the nascent music genre, but a WIlliam S. Burroughs street gang. (Check out their song Chelsea Kids for a dangerously good time) He also toured with the British National company of Hair and played a lead role in a BBC sitcom. He died of an overdose of morphine combined with alcohol in 1985 at the tender age of 32. In doing this research, I came across the missing link that ties it all together, the video for Ruby. It’s worth watching, even if you don’t want to listen to the rest of this admittedly odd record. The album cover image is taken directly from the video, which also includes a remixed edit of the song that’s slightly less cheesy and more radio friendly. Knowing what I did about the ultimate fate of Mr. Holton, I found it quite compelling. It also changed how I felt about Good Ol’ Gary, with lines like “I’ll be rockin’ and rollin’ in heaven.” Sometimes looking a little deeper than just the cover pays off. https://youtu.be/WU01haMIf6g
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