Wildy
6/7/2010


Dick50 is, among other things, the backing band for Delbert McClinton. Creative souls themselves, the band plays and writes their own material when they’re not supporting McClinton. Dick50’s Late Show is a charming album mixing elements of Rock, Funk and Soul in a blissed out, melancholy package. The band shows a distinctive ability to craft catchy melodies and arrangements while exploring sounds from garage to blues-inflected pop. Highlights include the funky “Flyin’ Now”, “Medicine Man”, the raw garage anthem “Dirty South” and the Black Crowes inspired “Goldilocks”. This is a band that’s fun to listen to at home, but likely a whole lot more fun in a roadside bar on a Saturday night where Lynyrd Skynyrd and .38 Special share billing on the jukebox with Stevie Ray Vaughan and Hank Williams, Jr. Late Show is entertaining.


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Nick Cristiano
05/16/2010

[Dick50 comprises four core members of the great Delbert McClinton’s band: bassist Steve Mackey, keyboardist Kevin McKendree, guitarist Rob McNelly, and drummer Lynn Williams. (They also happen to be among Nashville’s top session men, having worked with B.B. King, John Hiatt, and Dolly Parton, among others.)


If the members of Dick50 can’t quite match the singing and writing of their boss at his best – few can – they still expand on his rock-and-soul amalgam with their own authoritative touch. They bring deep grooves, a bluesy edge, and an occasional ’70s vibe (notice the clavinet on “Medicine Man”), while “2012″ shows they can downshift from
roadhouse rambunctiousness to affecting, midtempo balladeering. Oddly enough, “Theme From Dick50″ veers in a different direction: It’s a fun blast of vintage atmospherics that sounds like a collision of Dick Dale and Ennio Morricone.




Find the Article also at Philly.com

Check out this review of LateShow from the Virginian Pilot’s column, Soundwaves.  Also, be sure to read our other great reviews on our Music Reviews page here.  Please share your comments about the album too in the comment box!

Lynn Williams Of DICK50

2010-04-20

Hey, all you MD readers, Lynn Williams here, drummer for DICK50. I’m always interested to know how bands get together, and just how the right group of people make it “a band.” It seems to me that you know you have the right group of people when you don’t have to talk so much about what you’re going to play, you just start playing and a wonderful thing happens. Sometimes it may take a while for all the players to be comfortable with each other, and other times it happens from the very first note.

The four of us in DICK50 have been working together in different musical situations, recording and playing live, for ten-plus years. The last few years we’ve been working with Delbert McClinton, playing live and on all his studio stuff. During soundchecks we would come up with these great song ideas and of course nobody could remember the idea later. So the solution was to go into the studio and just start jamming like we did during soundcheck. The result is our first CD, LateShow.

The recording process on this CD was a bit unusual. We decided that we would record the rhythm tracks with everyone in the same room—amps, drums, keys—everything all together. The four-piece drumkit was set up in a corner of the room with two mics—one on the kick drum and one placed between the snare and first tom. There was a small bass amp behind me, with a guitar amp to my right and keyboard amp to my left, with one mic on each amp. We also had two room mics coming out of the upstairs loft, about twelve feet above us. We recorded everything until we came up with an idea that we all liked. Then we would work up the arrangement, then record that until we all got it right. There was no fixing of the basic tracks; we all had to play the song down correct at the same time. After the basic tracks were done, we overdubbed vocals, guitar solos, and a few other things.

We were all involved in the writing, recording, and production of the project. Each day that we got together we would write and record one song. We would go in the studio with a clean slate and at the end of the day have a song completed and recorded. I’m very happy with how it turned out.

We are still Delbert McClinton’s band, and we’ll be doing some opening slots for Delbert and some shows on our own. You can check us out at the links below.

As far as gear, a big “thank you” to Paiste cymbals, Remo heads, Vic Firth sticks, and Pearl drums. I also want to mention that we were in Switzerland a few weeks ago and I had the privilege to take a tour of the Paiste factory—a fantastic experience, it was great to see how it’s all done. Thank you, Roger, for showing us around. Love those big hats.

Got to go for now, so, see you down the road. Visit us at www.dick50.com and come see us at a Delbert McClinton show. Check out tour dates at www.delbert.com.

Find the Article also at moderndrummer.com

Bill Kopp’s music blog: features, reviews, interviews, essays and whatnot
4/15/10

Critics have a predilection — for both good and ill, one supposes — for labeling, for pigeonholing. And it’s useful too, when you get right down to it. Though some bristle at the idea — some months ago a commenter took issue with a review of mine, complaining about critics’ insistence upon the “compare and contrast” formula, as if such an approach was a bad thing — some degree of labeling can help the reader form some basic ideas about the music under consideration. Will I like this? Well, if the reviewer (in whose opinion I place some level of trust) says they sound like a cross between the Bay City Rollers and Metal Machine Music era Lou Reed, well, that’s a useful touchstone.

That said, it’s admittedly delightful when a CD crosses this reviewer’s desk, and attempts to label it are confounded. So it is with Dick50. This four-piece act out of Nashville is comprised of four seasoned session players, and perhaps the versatility required to be a Nashville cat explains why the group is so difficult to pigeonhole. Dick50 has just released their debut album Lateshow, and the disc’s eleven tunes show their taste and versatility.

Perhaps — if the term weren’t such a loaded one, fraught with baggage this reviewer often finds less than compelling — the music of Dick50 could be labeled Americana. Within their grooves are the influences of country, soul, r&b, greasy roadhouse rock and roll, and more. But Dick50 blends it all into an appetizing stew.

Onstage, Dick50 is equally hard to pin down. A song might kick off with Rob McNelly cutting a Memphis-styled lick a la Los Bravos‘ “Black is Black” (Lateshow’s opening track “Like You Did”), but when the band comes crashing in with their forceful and highly melodic arrangement, the dual lead vocals and clavinet-centered groove takes the song other places. And a heavily Leslie’d guitar solo is so brief as to leave the listener all but begging for more.

On “Flyin’ Now” Dick50 rocks every bit as hard as, say, the Black Crowes, but with more shade and light in their arrangement. Frequent changeups in a song’s meter are a hallmark of the Dick50 sound, but that variety isn’t of the look-ma-I’ve-got-chops gratuitous variety.

There’s a classicist vibe to Dick50’s music: warmly familiar guitar tones, well-traveled keyboard sounds (Wurlitzer, Rhodes, Hammond, Clavinet, etc.) and a rhythm section that’s both nimble and rock-solid. You’re equally likely to hear Hawaiian slack-key styled guitar licks, reggae beats and British Invasion styled song structures, and they’re all seamlessly integrated.

Fans of pretty much any mainstream American musical form will find plenty to like on Lateshow. The vocal harmonies sometimes evoke a Memphis version of Hall and Oates, and the lyrical content serves up that storytelling that c&w fans so dig. (Check out Lateshow’s “2012? for amusing and memorable proof of the latter: “Once we get to Armageddon, then we’ll get to the heavy pettin’.”) Dick50 don’t sound like Booker T & the MGs, but their level of taste is certainly in the ballpark of that revered group.

The group’s live show displays the breadth of Dick50’s prowess. Currently on tour with Delbert McClinton, Dick50 takes the hard-gigging approach of opening with their own set, then returning to back McClinton for his headlining show. The quartet is possessed of chops so impressive that they can deliver their original songs with personality, then turn around and provide high-energy, sympathetic backing to Delbert McClinton. This is a band to watch.

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Tom Carter
4/5/10

Think you don’t know Dick50? Well think again. The band consisting of guitarist Rob McNelley, bassist Steve Mackey, keyboardist Kevin McKendree and drummer Lynn Williams regularly plays backup to Delbert McClinton. When they aren’t backing the Texas bluesman the musicians are first-call session players in Nashville. And that doesn’t mean they record only behind country acts. Collectively the members of Dick50 have recorded with artists as diverse as B.B. King, Buddy Guy, Brian Setzer, John Hiatt and India Arie.Growing up in the ‘70s meant exposure to a vast range of influences due to the broad spectrum of music on the radio in those days.

The songs from Late Show carry the styles of McClinton’s Texas R&B/country in “Like You Did,” Tom Petty type pop rock with “So We Shine,” NRBQ-sounding N’awlins groove on “Medicine Man,” Jimmy Cliff reggae/soul with “Make It Right” and Stones hard rocking on “Goldilocks.” The swampy blues of “Down” would fit Tony Joe White while “Theme From Dick50” is reminiscent of early Johnny Cash (“Ghost Riders In The Sky” comes to mind) with Carl Perkins rock ‘n roll backing. All the songs, however, have their own original touches that prevent them from sounding like intentional knock-offs. Instead they sound like fresh new versions of classic styles and that is exactly what they are. Amazingly each song was written and recorded in a single session. “Eleven songs; eleven days,” as Mackey puts it. The musical cohesiveness and mutual instincts required by such a feat is reflected clearly in this exciting offering.

Dick50 and Becky Schlegel scoot boots and flex their roots respectively on new discs

By Ron Wynn

Need a backup band that can handle anything from Americana to zydeco and all points in between? Delbert McClinton does, and that’s why the harmonica ace and bandleader surrounds himself with a band made up of guitarist/vocalist Rob McNelley, keyboardist/vocalist Kevin McKendree, bassist/vocalist Steve Mackey and drummer Lynn Williams. Individually, they have played with B.B. King, Buddy Guy, Brian Setzer, John Hiatt, Dolly Parton, India.arie and Lady Antebellum. Together, with McClinton and now as a side project, they go by the handle Dick50.

What brought them together as an act was something much simpler than their numerous session dates. “Over the years with Delbert we noticed that there was something happening between us when we would get together for the soundchecks,” McNelley said. “There were some things we were doing musically there, or later when we would be rehearsing that were different and special, distinct from what we provided behind Delbert. It was an energy and a spontaneity that was so natural we just felt that we had to get something down on record.”

The result is the group’s first CD, Lateshow, which just came out this week. Though they don’t use the term “old school” in talking about the disc, the way it was produced and compiled definitely harkens back to another era.

“We were determined that we wouldn’t take a long time in the studio and that we wouldn’t sacrifice energy or spend too much time tinkering with things,” McNelley said. “So what we did was go into the studio every day determined to come out with a complete song. We’d go in, put the song together, sing over it, edit it and come out of there with a finished tune.”

They did the session’s 11 numbers in 11 days — a rarity in a studio climate where multiple producers are often brought in for discs, and the finished product might take a couple of years to assemble from component sessions. The CD fully showcases the various influences and idioms that permeate their music, from funk and first-generation R&B (“Medicine Man,” “Make It Right,”) on through Southern boogie and blues (“Dirty South,” “Flying Now”) to soulful rock (“Down,” “So We Shine”). Anchoring McNelley’s evocative vocals, the tight rhythm section of McKendree, Mackey and Williams displays the fervor that’s fortified McClinton’s leads and harmonica solos. In addition, they tout the famed bandleader among their biggest fans.

“Actually being with Delbert all these years has been the ideal training ground for a band,” McNelley says. “He’s a big supporter and we’re getting to open for him on a bunch of his shows, which really gives us a great audience and helps to get the disc out there to people. Plus we’re open to doing some more shows if things work out, though we’d have to arrange our schedules a bit.”

As a result, over the next few months Dick50 will be both a solid backup band and first-rate performing ensemble, a juggling act only a group with their lengthy track record of accomplishments would attempt. “We’re really excited about this CD and we plan to keep the group going as well,” McNelley says. “It’s really kind of having the best of two worlds happening right now.”

Check out the article on NashvilleScene.com here.

Bentley’s Bandstand Review
3/18/2010

It is not always easy being someone else’s backing band. You may have a setful of songs of your own, but when can you play them? Not on the bosses’ time. The audience did not pay to hear the bass player’s or drummer’s songs, unless your name is McCartney or Starr. But it turns out roadhouse rock master Delbert McClinton, who really is one of the great singers on the planet, has an incredible band behind him named oddly enough Dick50. Really. They have mastered the brilliant blue-eyed soul of their front man, and taken it a couple of notches deeper on songs like “2012″ and “Friend of Mine.” Their approach is contemporary, as much rock as anything else, and the four members of Dick50 has a dozen influences that steer them right. Most of all, they use soul music changes for rock&roll songs, and have the instrumental and emotional capability to make it work. What really brings everything is the vocal power of the band, because Late Show is the full-tilt boogie when it comes to the singers. Add enough fire power to burn down a bandstand, and you proof that it isn’t all up to the front man to supply the intrigue.

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