The Merri Soul Sessions

Background

The Merri Soul Sessions is the twentieth studio album by Australian musician, Paul Kelly, which was issued on 12 December 2014 on his own label, Gawdaggie Records, and distributed by Universal Music Australia. Kelly had developed the concept after hearing Vika Bull sing lead vocals on her live version of his song, "Sweet Guy" – originally released as a single in June 1989 – during touring as a backing singer in his group. For the album Kelly provided lead vocals on two tracks and invited various vocalists to sing lead on the other nine of eleven tracks. Aside from Kelly or Vika Bull, individual tracks featured lead vocals by Linda Bull (her sister), Clairy Browne, Kira Puru or Dan Sultan.

The album was recorded live-in-the-studio in Northcote, with Kelly co-producing with Steve Schram (Clairy Browne & The Bangin' Rackettes), alongside the Merri Creek, which gave the album its name. Kelly explained his concept to Australian Musician's junocreative, "I started to imagine a soul revue type record performed live in the studio with a variety of singers and the one band."

Prior to the album's appearance Kelly released four double A-sided 7" vinyl singles, "The Merri Soul Singles, Volume 1" (July 2014), "The Merri Soul Singles, Volume 2" (August), "The Merri Soul Singles, Volume 3" (October) and "The Merri Soul Singles, Volume 4" (November). Kelly promoted the album with a national tour from January to February 2015. He was supported by Hiatus Kaiyote, a neo-soul quartet from Melbourne.

Reception

On the ARIA Albums Chart, The Merri Soul Sessions peaked at No. 17. Noel Mengel of News Limited's website, news.com.au, rated the album as four out of five stars and felt "[i]t's one of those records where you feel the spirit start to finish, nothing too fussed over, no one going through the motions. There's desperation in the lyrics and a lot of joy in the delivery. And all the best soul music has those two essential ingredients."

Michael Dwyer of The Age praised Browne's vocals on "Keep on Coming Back for More", which had been performed live by Kelly four years earlier on The A – Z Recordings (September 2010, as "I Keep on Coming Back for More"), as a track that was "waiting for Browne's extraordinary voice to send it up in flames." Kelly's nephew, Dan Kelly, was "firing jolts of electric guitar across the bow" while "Kelly rocks back and holds down the tense rhythm. Despite the modest tools at hand, it seems less likely the song will fall apart than that Browne will blow it inside out." Kelly agreed that some of his songs were better when sung by other vocalists.

Track listing

All tracks written by Paul Kelly, unless otherwise indicated.

Personnel