Raw, intense, varied Americana with a great ‘live’ feel.
Abnormal Conditions’ is the fifth album by upstate New York roots rockers Frank Migliorelli and the Dirt Nappers, and it is an absolute corker. It blends rock, soul, folk and even sixties pop in a wonderfully ‘live’ feeling record. With two members of Springsteen’s backing band in Soozie Tyrell and Lisa Lowell helping out, the pedigree of the band is unquestionable.
In his mid-sixties, Migliorelli has had a long and varied artistic career. He has been a computer and video game developer, written children’s music and worked in educational media and been a creative director at a design firm. He has also found time to produce blues and soul music before returning to writing and performing, which he has been doing for the past ten years. His first band formed at Michigan State University were called The Fender Clones. In the track ‘Michigan’ he refers to them as his band of brothers, and forty-three years later they still remain extremely close.
That song is a touching tribute to the State which despite him being a ‘New Yorker’ he still calls home underlying his deep alliance to that part of the country that “got under his skin, just a little bit more than I thought you did”. As with all the tracks here, the song is beautifully and thoughtfully written, wonderfully played and well produced. That said it still has a live feel to it. As he notes, “I really wanted to push this album into a little bit more of a raw kind of unfinished sound and I think we got there…..It sounds good. I’m pretty happy with that”
There is also a political element to the album with the track Fire Road which has a stinging comment on the current right-wing situation in America and serves as an emotional high point on the record with its Tom Petty-style guitars and its genuine raw energy. That’s contrasted with She’ll Wait to Hear the Heartbeat which is a pure sixties doo-wop tune straight out of the Dion songbook. Fans of the Waterboys will enjoy Year of Living Dangerously. It’s a tune that could sit very easily on Fisherman’s Blues, his vocals being very similar to Mike Scott’s. In another change of atmosphere in This Whiskey Won’t Burn’ is such a poignant break up song with all the heartbreak and angst you can handle.
The album is a mixture of genres with more than a hint of motown and even some reggae as well as the usual rock and folk. It makes it a very listenable record indeed and should increase Migliorelli’s profile considerably which may well be lead it to appearing in end of year lists.
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