Scooter Chronicles

Dick Siegel - “Snap!”

Tracks:

1. Downsize Blues
2. Angelo’s
3. Razzle-Dazzle
4. She’s Available
5. When the Sumac is on Fire
6. The Cave In
7. What Would Brando Do?
8. Chicago (Cast Off Alone)
9. Carry Me Away
10. Cure for Your Blues

The same guy (Garey) that introduced me to “Machine Head” by Deep Purple, also introduced me to Dick Siegel. He even told me where to get it, Schoolkids Records in Ann Arbor, MI. It was a record store that also had their own record label. They were the company that issued the re-release of this album.

Dick Siegel was born and raise in Orange County, New Jersey, but settled in Ann Arbor while going to school at U-M. He’s in the Michigan Music Hall of Fame, and was voted one of the most influential artists to come out of Detroit in a poll by WDET, Wayne State University’s radio station (along with John Lee Hooker, Aretha Franklin, and Stevie Wonder to name a few).

Siegel is by the most basic of standards a singer-songwriter. His songs tell stories, whether serious or humorous, though most of the songs on this album fall under humorous. Or at the delivery give it that feeling. As for the music itself, at times it has a rockabilly sound to it, and others like vocal jazz with saxophones. Some have described it as roots and Chicago blues. In some ways it’s folk as well. His following albums leaned more that way.

One song however almost could be seen as an advertisement, that being “Angelo’s”. It is an ode (for lack of a better term) to Angelo’s Restaurant in Ann Arbor, apparently famous for serving breakfast back in the day. I had heard this song a few times before hearing the whole album since it was played on WCSX, the main classic rock station in Detroit at the beginning of their Sunday morning show called “Over Easy.” The lyrics are a good fit for the name (”Oh what a wonderful thing to do / Eggs over easy, hash browns, and you”).

My two favorites on the album are “Downsize Blues” where Siegel rips General Motors for “downsizing” the Cadillac and what it has done to his psyche. (”Well now, fifty feet will never make a mile / Sidewalk puddle never be a lake / You can strike up a match here and you won’t have a star / You can buy yourself a Caddy now, all ya gets a car”)

The other is “What Would Brando Do?” which is the question that everyone asks. Well, at least in the song. The main character has a real dilemma with his girlfriend and his best friend and their past tryst, and throughout the question is “Well, what would Brando do?”

I wasn’t sure this was even in-print anymore, until I stumbled across it at CD Baby. (You can listen to samples there.) So glad I got a copy of this. And very glad that Garey brought it into work to let me listen to it.