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Stacko WaxSteve Miller Band — “The Joker”The gangster is hack.Alter failing to put out anything but a couple of minutes worth of decent recorded material in the last three years, “The Joker” stands as the Steve Miller Band’s best album since “Number 5.” Like all of Miller’s albums, the material is pretty uneven. When Miller is at his best, he is as good as anyone; when in his lesser moments he can be depressingly dismal. But the dismal moments on The Joker” are lew, and the highpoints are frequent enough to overcome themeasily.The album kicks ofl to a rousing start with “Sugar Babe a classic rocker in the Miller tradition. From the lirst few bars it’s obvious that the new Miller band is the best since the earlv davs. Gerald Johnson is easilym m •»one of the top bass players in rock today, John King’s drumming is as precise as the best of the Motown drummers, and Dickie Thompson’s keyboard work isjust right. Miller’s guitar playing is as good as ever as isevidenced in “Shu Ba Da Du Ma Ma Ma Ma,” aMusicnumber which was leatured in the band’s performance here last spring. After a short and unfortunately disappointing Johnson bass solo, Miller steps in with a gliding double tracked solo which builds to a series of piercing sustained notes, breaking into a flurry ot stunning runs; a perfect example of why Miller is a rock guitarist second to none. Other standouts on “The Joker are an excellent up-tempo blues (“Your Cash Ain’t Nothin’ But Trash”) and a slow haunting blues (“Evil”) which is a showcase for Miller’s clear, sensitive vocal work and some more blistering solos.Steve Miller fans will love this album. Others will lind it to be one of the best albums released this year. Significantly, the Miller Band is one of the few groups to get back on the trackagain. 1 hope this album is only a beginning. Musicians with the talent of Steve Miller are very rare, indeed. Should “The Joker” be only an indication of what we canexpect from the SteveMiller Band in the future, we have much to look forward to again. In the meantime, I’m going to dig on “The Joker” and hope that it’s not three years before we have another album of this caliber.
Newspaper Details
Geneva Herald
Geneva, New York, US
Fri, Oct 12, 1973
Page 4
Full Page
Clipped by
Dave N.
USA 06 Feb 2023
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