Record review: “Salvation” by John Salaway
John Salaway’s new album Salvation isn’t a straight-ahead blues record. Nor does he try to pretend it is. What Salvation is, is an album of ten great songs that are a montage of influences, including blues, soul, older R n’ B, rock, and folk tied together by Beatle-esque composition.
Salaway’s voice is the perfect compliment to the tunes. He tells the story of each song without over-singing. He’s also done a great job creating the arrangements on each song. The sound of each song really fits the tale he’s singing about. There is a lot of variety of sounds on the record, from slide guitar, to horn sections, to organ. And yet with all the different tones, the whole album still has a cohesive retro vibe to it. If I had to guess, I’d say John made this album to sound like the music that made him want to sing and play in the first place.
Salaway is a man of many talents, not only singing, but also playing guitar, drums, bass, and piano on the album - and doing each very well, I might add. But he also shares the spotlight, as ‘Salvation’ features a host of all-star musicians from Foo Fighters, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Cage the Elephant, Smashing Pumpkins, Anderson East, Peter Frampton’s band and has one of my favorite regional guitarists – Joey Fletcher – on it also.
I’d recommend John Salaway’s Salvation album to everyone who is looking for some new music that doesn’t sound like new music.
We’re featuring the track “Tied to You” at the player at the bottom of our website.
“Tied to You” is written by John Salaway & Meg Williams.
Produced by John Salaway & Joshua Koskela
All instruments by John Salaway except horns and flutes by Nate Heffron (Anderson East) & Backing vocals by Katie Cole (Smashing Pumpkins)
To order “Salvation” on CD or find out where John is playing, go to www.johnsalaway.com