Tim Gartland

Right Amount of Funky

Taste Good Music

You can practically see the molasses hanging from Tim Gartland’s wise drawl. The music here on his sixth album? Likewise creamy, pungent, and as tasty as can be. The Right Amount of Funky? Hell yes, twice over, and certified.

When Gartland was 13, he witnessed Muddy Waters perform his magic. Like many, the experience charted a course for life. Young Tim Gartland took up harmonica, and the blues. Leaving his home state Ohio behind on a beeline to Chicago after graduating college, he quickly began sitting in with some of the Windy City’s best. Another move to Boston at the tail end of the 80s resulted in a debut album and heaps of praise. But Gartland’s desire to dive deeper into songwriting with a wider perspective drove him to Music City eleven years ago. Now he plays his sweet, Little Walter-inspired harp licks to pepper songs rooted in Chicago blues, but stepping four toes onto Nashville’s Bluebird Café smorgasbord, three into the doors of a Beale Street saloon, and the other three in a Louisiana swamp. These eight new Tim Gartland gems—two co-written with singer/songwriter (and his publicist) Karen Leipziger—convey rousing little vignettes that showcase a loose-rolling band playing as tight as a drum.

“Waste a Worry” opens the show. Right off, Gartland’s way with a harp and a turn of phrase highlights a right funky and breezy groove, instantly magnetic. The title song follows, Gartland’s confident, Dr. John-like counseling emphasized by his stylish tooting and Robert Frahm’s hot as a pistol guitar figures. Frahm leads the band that otherwise features Jack Bruno on drums (Tina Turner and Joe Cocker) and Mike Joyce on bass (Delbert McClinton). Nalani Rothrock adds striking spice singing background vocals.

The two songs co-written with Leipziger stand tall among the other six peaks. “A Better Life,” with music that ties a kind of Cuban street rumba to music radiating from a dusty American roadhouse, underscores an ideal that people from outside American borders with “pocketsful of dreams” deserve a welcome. The melancholy music underscores their hurdles. The infectious rhythm and blues beat in “Walk Away” then gets the leg moving—perhaps both legs—as Gartland advises a quick exit from a bad scene. For “Alone Times,” a snaky rhythm supports an endearing thought crucial to us all, conveyed in wonderfully descriptive prose.

Those that appreciate top-quality blues harmonica playing combined with songs of the caliber and sometimes the flavor of Tony Joe White’s, and melodies from all over the Little Feat realm, will love this album. Perfectly produced to induce an easy melting into its heat, Right Amount of Funky follows Gartland’s equally excellent 2022 album, Truth, into an early best of the year slot.

Tom Clarke for MAS

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