Photo by Ken Hanson
Paul Cebar
Paul Cebar
“The roof will hold for another year,” Paul Cebar sings on “Didn’t Bring It Up.” So maybe it’s a bit of cosmic coincidence that he immediately apologizes for some recent water damage to his place. On this evening, two decades and eerily close to the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina I did not have the guts to ask the condition of the New Orleans section of his record collection. Thankfully, Cebar’s treasured LPs remained safe.
The genesis for new album, titled Paul Cebar, began before the pandemic and moved through several stages, music being just one of them. The album includes various permutations of Paul Cebar Tomorrow Sound (the live group of Reggie Bordeaux on drums, Mike Fredrickson on bass and Bob Jennings on keyboards and saxophone), and a handful of other players including producer-engineer-multi-instrumentalist Alex Hall. Cebar also credits Jake Guralnick, who offered an ear and objective opinions on the collection of songs that had been recorded at a number of different studios and situations—including Cebar’s home demos.
Pre-pandemic, Cebar had worked regularly in the studio with the late Mike Hoffmann on a number of projects—citing Hoffmann’s positive energy and ability to experiment, bringing vibrancy. With Hoffmann’s passing in 2021, Cebar was casting about for the next chapter in his recording odyssey.
He was put in touch with Milwaukee’s Cloudland Recording studio and in 2019 Tomorrow Sound recorded and finished a pair of songs before the pandemic beckoned. Those songs—“We Sure Got Enough” which offers a shot of Farfisa-energized pop and “Keep On (Lookin’ Like That),” a soulful, sultry slow-burning tune—are standouts and kicked things off on the good foot.
Then came lockdown.
Gospel Detour
“We were out of luck for a year and a half,” Cebar recalls, When he met with Alex Hall (Reliable Recorders/Hi-Style Studio in Chicago), to see if they were simpatico in the studio, he knew he was on the right track.
|
|
“We had a blast,” Cebar laughs, “we ended up not using those recordings, but I knew it was going to work.” Hall’s resume includes work with The Flat Five, JD McPherson and Rami and The Reliables.
A few years ago, Cebar was contacted by Steve Berlin (Los Lobos) who was set to produce an album by The Blind Boys of Alabama and asked if Cebar had potential songs for the album. He forwarded some of his own songs as well as those by fellow songwriters Mike Fredrickson and John Sieger—songs that could be envisioned fitting a gospel project.
“In the course of things Steve got aced out and ended up being one of four producers” and apologized that the songs would probably not be included.
Early 2020, Charles Driebe—manager of The Blind Boys of Alabama (who Cebar had previously pitched the idea of writing with Stax legend William Bell), contacted Cebar looking for songs for another project. “I haven’t done it,” Cebar says of the assignment of writing on spec for The Blind Boys of Alabama. But he was more than willing to give it a shot.
As an agnostic, Cebar wrote secularized material that was open to interpretation; “If You Lead Me” draws from the way the group takes the stage. “The most-sighted of them is in the front and they put their hand on each other’s shoulder and they have that procession. I always thought that was beautiful.”
He came up with six songs including what he had sent to Berlin for the earlier project. “When We Sing” was another of the songs Cebar had submitted.
“There is a such a solidarity in singing. That’s one of the things you take away from their shows or any gospel show,” Cebar says.
He gives credit to Ry Cooder and Taj Mahal as being influences. “Ry has always been doing gospel stuff—the sound of gospel is all over his stuff.”
Just before the lockdown Driebe called to say the songs would not be part of the project. The silver lining was Cebar now had half an album in his back pocket.
Photo by Ken Hanson
Paul Cebar Tomorrow Sound
Paul Cebar Tomorrow Sound
Covid Challenges
“I’m the only one who didn’t go into the family business,” Cebar jokes about his parents and sister, who all were teachers.
Yet anyone who has tuned into his weekly radio show on WMSE (and many years previously on 88.9) would disagree. Cebar’s knack for connecting musical, cultural and historical dots rates as a weekly three-hour master class. During the lockdown his shows were received like notes from the underground.
With Covid in the air, challenges presented as obstacles to working in recording studios. Cebar’s decision to collaborate with Hall magnified.
“(Kick Up) The Lovin’ Sound,” is a slice of manic inspirational joy—a nearly a Capella tune that is certainly informed by the gospel section of Cebar’s experience. Cebar suggested a treatment of the song as if recorded by Little Richard and The Upsetters, with Hall’s playing in keeping in mind drummer Earl Palmer.
Cebar’s praise of Hall, who he says reminds him of working with Hoffmann, could be a letter of recommendation. Hall’s ear and engineering skillset coupled with his ease of collaboration were key in the final album’s choices.
“Hold out Hope”
Before the album would be released Cebar would negotiate personal loss. In early 2024 his father Tony would pass at age 100. The centenarian was a visible presence at Milwaukee Sound concerts, especially those in the local parks. Later that same year Cebar’s wife Cynthia Zarazua would also pass away. The former New Orleanian’s exuberant personality and non-stop dancing set her as a fixture at any concert she attended. The album includes a tribute Zarazua as well as images of the couple’s Milwaukee home—which certainly recalls the Crescent City.
But to rewind a bit, Cebar had reached out to Jake Guralnick periodically for bits of advice. The son of writer Peter Guralnic, Jake represents Nick Lowe, John Doe and Los Straitjackets, among others—a roster that Cebar would well fit in.
“Hold out Hope” a reggae tune, perhaps a political commentary that looks to a horizon when things returned to whatever would be seen as “normal.”
Cebar’s notebooks, digital and otherwise, are filled with ideas. One never knows when an idea from 25 years ago will surface as relevant to project.
The spare, haunting “Sunday Ride” was inspired by the day after a gig in Detroit a quarter of a century ago. Cebar describes the first day of a fall, still in summer’s thrall. Detroit’s giant Uniroyal tire, and a vivid recollections of a pair of motorists set the scene—a poised place in time.
“It was just perfect,” he recalls, “crazy clouds, 75 degrees … we saw this guy pulled over to the side of the road and his license plate read ‘MRJAZZ.’ It was a brown, giant Cadillac and he had a brown leather suit and jacket that matched the car. And just down the way was a guy on a motorcycle that also had a leather suit that matched the saddle bags on his bike. Both African Americans and complete dudes.”
Late evenings at home, Cebar would pick up a guitar in an open tuning, strumming quietly and a chord sequence came about.
In the studio Hall sat behind the drumkit, Scott (Ligon) sat at the Hammond organ “and 15 minutes later we had it.” Essentially, Cebar waited for the song, allowing it 25 years to basically write itself.
Handing Off
With the collection of 15 songs finished, Cebar realized he was too close to the project and asked Guralnick if he would give his thoughts on song selection and sequencing. “It was a relief for me to turn it over to somebody,” Cebar says of Guralnick’s ideas. “It felt good every time I’d hear it. It flowed and took you somewhere.”
The album as released is 11 songs in Guralnick’s order; songs with distinct personalities but can’t be pinned down. Guralnick’s take was the songs remind the listener of good times, without being retro. “Jake saw the album as a ‘60s kind of the thing.” Material that hinted at the ‘70s or ‘80s didn’t; make the cut, presumably saved for another project.
Guralnick also agreed to pitch the record to prospective labels. It found a home with Dick Connette’s StorySound Records via Gurlanick’s wife Connie Kirch, a music project manager—“she loved the record,” Cebar says.
A deal was struck at the end of ’23, with a plan to release the record in the spring of ’24. When Cebar lost his father and wife the label was understanding. “Dick called the next day and said, ‘We are ready when you are ready.’ I was very relieved.”
Tosa Fest
On a Saturday evening few weeks before the album would be released, Paul Cebar Tomorrow Sound are set up under a full moon in Wauwatosa’s Root Common Park, the greenspace packed with dancers and Tosafest goers.
Overcoming sound-gremlins early in the set—“Tell the kid with the iPad I don’t have monitors,” Mike Fredrickson requests—Cebar and the band are in sparkling form with Bordeaux and Jennings taking solo spots to the appreciation of the audience. Fredrickson’s harmony vocals add depth to Cebar’s sentiments.
Not too far in the rear-view mirror, a gathering like this would have been impossible. Yet here he is.
The release show for Paul Cebar Tomorrow Sound’s sound is scheduled for Shank Hall, Friday Oct. 3.
