Best-known for his songs that were recorded by others (including Jimmy Buffett, Arlo Guthrie and David Allan Coe), Steve Goodman released a long string of excellent albums of his own before dying of leukemia in 1984. Many of them have now been reissued on his Red Pajamas label through John Prine’s Oh Boy Records, but this live album is a previously unreleased treasure of a performance, taken from a radio broadcast apparently in the early 1980s (though the date is not listed in the liner notes).
Most live tapes of Goodman are solo acoustic shows, with little more than a mandolin player for window dressing. For this particular tour, however, he was accompanied by bassist Rick Chudacoff, drummer Peter Bunetta, pianist Jim Enger, percussionist Arno Lucas, keyboardist Amy Madigan, and horn player Jim Rothermel.
The band transforms Goodman from a good-natured folkie into a full-throttle country-rocker, reclaiming even his best-known songs such as “City Of New Orleans” from those who had hits with them. This band comes across like a more polite version of Joe Cocker’s Mad Dogs & Englishmen combo, equally enthusiastic but lacking their substance-fueled haze.
Primarily apparent is how much fun Goodman seems to be having. From the off-the-cuff intros to the rollicking renditions of songs such as “Men Who Love Women Who Love Men”, he is constantly cutting up, even laughing through some of the lines on “Hand It To You”.
Goodman can get serious when the song requires it, however, turning in a poignant rendition of Michael Smith’s “The Dutchman” and a melancholy, lilting take on his own “Banana Republics”. The sweetness in Goodman’s voice echoes another gone-too-soon songwriter, Harry Chapin, on the wistful “Would You Like To Learn To Dance”.
Like the covers other artists did of his material, this full-on live performance shows another side to the already excellent songs of Steve Goodman, one that strips away the ’70s production of his albums in favor of a sound that is honest, amiable, and ultimately more affecting.