It’s Not the Fall, It’s the Sudden Stop

I am desperate to thaw winter’s hard cruel grip on my bones. Maybe a trick of the mind will do it – all I have to do is listen to this over & over & over again.

• Dave Cloud & Gospel of Power, “Summer Holiday” (buy here)

Didn’t work. Oh well. Now I’m still cold, but happier.

As you can no doubt tell, Dave Cloud is a snorting wildman from Nashville. A land where they hardly have winter at all, though I can testify as an eyewitness that the Opryland Hotel – O sad, gaudy city-state! – at least has Xmas spirit in punishing amounts.

This is from a double-disc set called Napoleon of Temperance. When I put this CD into my computer the “genre” tag that comes up is Easy Listening, and it’s good to know that the machine has a sense of humour. Or maybe it’s just thrown by the Bee Gees and Bacharach covers, I dunno.

Anyway, so yeah, Napoleon of Temperance. Two discs, 40-something songs, covers of the Stones and Dylan and Bowie and KC & the Sunshine Band and all kinds of others, plus all kinds of loopy originals, like the a-mazing “Lavender Clothes.” I found this in that CD barn at Bloor & Bathurst, and I must admit it was nice to feel the thrill of the chase again, scarce as that is in this Internet age. But you can buy it online too.

OK, one more. But seriously, support the man.

• Dave Cloud & Gospel of Power, “Sudden Stop” (buy here)