21 March 2024
Marques Morel has been described as a singer/songwriter, as well as wandering troubadour (along with a few other descriptive adjectives). His voice will remind you fondly of country outlaws, like Johnny Cash and Waylon Jennings. It’s a low voice, with lots of vibrato. If you miss hearing country singers that sound like they are actually from the country, Morel oughta scratch that itch for ya.
His album Tales and Tellings is filled with travel stories and everyman philosophy. For instance, “Gas Station Girls” sounds a bit like an old Hank Williams song. (I don’t honestly know what a ‘gas station girl’ is, but I don’t suspect these are the same as church choir women). More than likely, they’re a whole lot like truck stop girls. Many of these songs are sung with colorful flair, such as “Lone Rooster Blues,” which includes plenty of twang combined with organ fills. It finds Morel cock-a-doodling his way through the chorus, too, much like a yard rooster does.
This music is traditional American music, from beginning to end. The album’s final song, “Back at the Cabin,” for instance, is driven by acoustic guitar and is spiced up with some nice fiddling. Just the fact that he’s celebrating being back at the old cabin, says a lot about Morel’s perspective on life. The city life can’t do what time spent in and old cabin can do. It’s a place where he can get away from the loud urban life, and back to a place where he feels more at home.
The album begins with one we all can relate to, titled “Crazy Out There.” Morel sings/speaks his way through it. It offers honest commentary on our contemporary world. Sure, the planet has always had its craziness, but after surviving a pandemic and a political climate that doesn’t make a lot of sense – to either those on the right or the left – it just feels crazier now than it’s ever been. If you’re from the country where the living is simple, today’s culture might just make you think the inmates have taken over the asylum. One called “Drive All Night,” might just throw you for a loop. Morel may lean mostly toward folk and country grooves, but this one sports a bit of a reggae groove to it. It also finds Morel singing in a register that is slightly higher than the rest of the tunes.
Yes, it’s crazy out there. There’s little we all can do to stop all the crazy. We can, though, fill our hearts and minds with solid and enjoyable music. With Tales and Tellings, Marques Morel gives us all a set of powerful traditional sounds in which to put our roots. That voice of his just sounds like a voice of experience. He’s seen a lot in his lifetime, yet he still has a good attitude. He creates musical comfort food for many of us. Especially those of us that greatly miss icons like Cash and Jennings. Let’s hope Morel keeps telling his tales for a long, long time to come.
Dan MacIntosh - Dan MacIntosh has been a professional music journalist for 30 years and his work has regularly appeared in many local and national publications, including Inland Empire Weekly, CCM, CMJ, Paste, Mean Street, Chord, HM, Christian Retailing, Amplifier, Inspirational Giftware, Stereo Subversion, Indie-Music, Soul–Audio, Roughstock.com, Country Standard Time and Spin.com.
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