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An excerpt of "Step Outside," from Patrick Sweany's "C'mon C'mere"

The first track on Patrick Sweany’s new CD C’mon C’mere is ironically titled “Nobody Dance.” It’s ironic because the track is instead likely to provoke plenty of groovin’ when the effervescent maracas kick in. Recorded by ex-Squirrel Nut Zipper and Grammy Award-winning Buddy Guy producer/sideman Jimbo Mathus along with Dan Auerbach of the Akron, Ohio blues-rock duo the Black Keys, the overall sound is raw and alive. It sounds like a band playing in a little joint—and this primitive approach provides the right tone for these rock-solid compositions, all written by Sweany. “Step Outside” is a shack-shakin’ standout. The tune percolates like a hot pot of coffee. Listeners are then swept into the bittersweet, achingly lonely “World of Love.” Sweany and his band—Clint Alguire on drums and Bob Basone on baritone guitar (with help from Jon Finley on baritone guitar)—excel at these R&B-flavored ballads. Check out “An Understanding”—an Otis Redding-style breakup tune—filled with dramatic rests between the verses and bridge, a forlorn Wurlitzer hovering in the background like a ghost. It feels like a song written in Macon, Georgia or Memphis sometime in the mid 1960s. Listen to Sweany’s pleading vocals: “Never thought I’d think about it/you fall in love, and then you’re out/hard to be anything but mad/but you’re still a Mom/I’m still a Dad/it don’t bother me all the time/just every day/and most of the night/it’s an understanding.” Sadly, some “understandings” are just too painful to grasp. But C’mon C’mere is filled with many shades of blue, from house-rockin’ numbers like “Stark County” to the distortion-soaked, real folk blues stomp of “The Waterfall.” And Jimbo Mathus fans will get a kick out of the wildly traded solos on the instrumental “The Hornet.” Sweany, an inventive guitarist in his own right—he's a regular teacher at Jorma Kaukonen's Fur Peace Ranch along with folks like G.E. Smith, Roy Book Binder and John Hammond—sounds like he's having fun with one of America’s oldest musical forms, the blues, by casting it in a contemporary light while pulling it all up by its deep, dark roots.