Ol’ Glory – J J Grey and Mofro (Provogue Records) reviewed by Dave Franklin

 Some music seems to define a point in time, some aims to make a statement; other music may just be about a feeling. JJ Grey and Mofro make music that is a lot more about a sense of place and that place is definitely America and more specifically The South. By taking the basic tenants of soulful r’n’b and adding helpings of blues, southern rock, gospel, funk and folk, they create a sound that has one foot in a Memphis soul strut and the other in a more bucolic southern sound.

If there is a point where American roots music meets the Stax sound via southern swap blues, then this is it. 12 tracks that dance and groove across a quintessential Americana soundscape, one that blends all the hallmarks of various southern styles into a sort of Dixie dreamtime sound for a re-imagined heart-on-sleeve heartland. Both musically and lyrically this sounds like nothing less than America’s beating heart. And to be fair it is probably an America that never existed outside it’s road movies, TV adverts, beat legacy, literature and other rose tinted nostalgia, but in my mind it is what America should sound like.