Recorded in a live setting in 1982 -- the same year as his
Middle Class White Boy album --
Lessons in Living is a mixed bag. The material is terrific, and
Mose Allison is in typically fine form. The issue lies more with the "all-star" band assembled for the date: bassist
Jack Bruce, drummer
Billy Cobham, and soloists
Eric Gale (guitarist) and
Lou Donaldson ( alto saxophonist). For starters,
Allison didn't need a large band --or any band, really -- to shine. Though he had been absent from the recording scene for six years until that point, he had continued to perform live and his chops as both a pianist and a singer are stellar. These players, fine as they are, don't seem to understand the subtler kind of magic that
Allison puts across in a club setting, and don't know how to lay back enough -- this is particularly the case with
Cobham, who is overly busy throughout the date, double-timing already fast tunes like "Wild Man in the Street."
Bruce, playing electric bass, has a wonderful facility to move and shift gears with the pianist, but still feels a shade behind
Cobham's fast and furious beat -- the overdriven "Your Mind Is on Vacation" is a case in point. That said,
Allison feels like he is having the time of his life.
Donaldson's solo on "You Are My Sunshine" is stirring and raw, something that feels jarring at first with the wonderfully relaxed groove of
Allison's arrangement, but fits like a glove after a chorus. The stomping pace of
Willie Dixon's "Seventh Son" is a highlight on the set with
Cobham lightening his touch a bit and
Allison's vocal is swaggering and tough. The laid-back blues of "Everybody Is Crying Mercy" is another gem, with the band holding
Allison's blues loose and easy.
Lessons in Living is basically for
Allison devotees, but it has fantastic moments. Ironically,
Allison didn't return to recording again for another three years in 1986 after this set was issued. ~ Thom Jurek