Track Listing

1. Every 24 Hours
2. Million Dollars Bail
3. Underneath the Stars
4. Just Hangin' On
5. Ain't Gonna Worry No More
6. Palookaville
7. Get Away Blues
8. The Open Road Sons
9. Some Bright Mornin Blues
10. I'm Gonna Change My Ways
11. That Soul Twist

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #27100 in Music
• Released on: 2007-08-07
• Number of discs: 1

Album Description
Peter Case is back with Let Us Now Praise Sleepy John, his most raw, direct work in nearly a decade. This album of politically fueled songs finds America's golden troubadour in his finest form, laying down sparse, busker-style guitar work over his uniquely delivered dusty road-poetry. Now Let Us Praise Sleepy John is yet another volume in the career of one of the most storied singer/songwriters of his generation. Standard Jewel Case.

Amazon.com
Since his street-corner-playing days in Buffalo and on through nearly 30 years of making music, Peter Case always seemed to find time for a cover of Sleepy John Estes. Case's first album since 2002's Beeline actually goes one better, interpreting the legendary wailing blues master by stripping away adjunct instruments and pining for the carefree busking days where all that mattered were a guitar and a song to sing. And in this setting, not many can write them or sing them like Case. There are flat-picking observations on "two kinds of justice" in "Million Dollar Bail," recollections of Telly Savalas in the small-town predicaments of "Palookaville," and duets with both buddies (Carlos Guitarlos on "Underneath the Stars") and heroes (Richard Thompson on "Every 24 Hours"). There are no Estes covers, but acclimating Robert Wilkins's 80-year-old "Get Away Blues" is expressively close, as every pluck of the 12-string and lyrical tug from deep inside Case's gut does justice to the late Sleepy John. --Scott Holter

Customer Reviews

It's Beautiful
Every time I listen to Peter Case I think about a cold grey dawn on a colorado exit ramp. It was raining. It was beautiful. So is this album. You should buy it.
Thomas

Natural, understated, genuine
You can tell a great singer-songwriter if they're able to strip the songs down to just guitar (or piano) & vocal and make them work as good, if not better, than they would if they were fully-produced with drums, keyboards, bass, etc.

Peter Case is one of those singer-songwriters. This album is as free-flowing and natural as a conversation with the man himself. I wish more accomplished songwriters would make genuine, no-frills records like this instead of hiding behind contemporary (over)production values (a la Springsteen's latest).

Evocative of the spirit of the great bluesmen, with traces of Plastic Ono Band-era John Lennon in it's off-hand honesty and immediacy, albeit less wrenching than Lennon.

This album is timeless, while at the same time belonging unmistakably to the right here, and right now.

Alive Right Now
Peter Case's new CD "Let Us Now Praise Sleepy John" is an excellent acoustic folk set. Case shines with urgent vocals, acoustic guitar, great melodies & lyrics. Richard Thompson guests on vocals & guitar on the bright opener "Every 24 Hours," "I should've called home fore she went to sleep; I pray the Lord for her soul to keep; Tomorrow will tell who's been tending the sheep." "Million Dollars Bail" tells a sad story of how money may purchase justice but cannot buy happiness, "She dialed 911, but the cops didn't come on time; They found her on the marble with a bullet through her eye. ... There's two kinds of justice, everybody knows, one for folks up on the hill, the others down below." Case's music is deceptively simple such as on the lovely "Ain't Gonna Worry No More" with it's lulling guitar and lyrics busting with memory, "Fourteen dressed in his father's hat, even had a little mustache just like that; Told the crazy lady at the corner shop, 'I'll take a pack of Camels and bottle of Schnapps.'" "Forget tomorrow & that jam you're in; You're alive right now as you ever been," Peter sings on the losers' lament "That Soul Twist." Case's new CD is an excellent folk set from one of our most consistent artists. Enjoy!