A couple of weeks ago Little Feat, a band I really like, released a Deluxe version of their 1974 album Feats Don’t Fail Me Now complete with a disc of outtakes/alternate versions and a disc featuring part of a concert from 1975. I’ve been meaning to post about it but between seeing the Stones in Denver and Mike Campbell back in Kansas City I’ve just about needed to spend a week floating in a hyperbaric chamber or perhaps exchange my blood with some Swiss school children like Keith Richards to recover. Instead of those drastic measures I have been immersed in that sweet, sweet Little Feat, New Orleans-style funk and it has done my soul a lot of good.

I think I was just a touch too young for Little Feat. Their peak years, in my opinion were 1971 to 1974, when I was but a wee lad. Although I say that knowing their landmark live album Waiting For Columbus wasn’t released until 1978 and I’d actually started listening to rock n roll by then. And of course, Lowell George passed in 1979 after they’d broken up. I honestly don’t remember hearing any Little Feat, other than the song “Dixie Chicken” (their signature tune), on the local rock radio station. I don’t think Little Feat ever really got their due. I told a friend of mine, Dr. Rock, a few years ago I was listening to Little Feat and he laughed at me…an odd reaction. I was more aware of Little Feat’s leader Lowell George than the band in general as his friend Jackson Browne wrote a song for him after he passed, 1980’s “Of Missing Persons.” My brother had the album it was on and I’d hear it coming from his room from time to time. Jackson described George as “the Orson Welles of rock.” I was also aware that Linda Ronstadt had covered “Willin’,” a signature song of theirs. I probably knew her version before I knew Little Feat’s version. Since early on I had only heard “Dixie Chicken,” I considered them a bit of a one hit wonder like say, the Marshall Tucker Band.  I figured this band was a bunch of guys from a Louisiana swamp. Turns out they were all from California. Man, they sure could put on some good ol’ southern boogie though.

Guitarist/lead singer Lowell George formed Little Feat shortly after being fired by Frank Zappa. There are different version of that story but most folks believe it was because Zappa, a notorious tea totaler, was offended by the lyrics to George’s aforementioned song “Willin'” which references “weed, whites and wine.” There was also a rumor he’d been fired for playing a ten-minute guitar solo with his amp off. Regardless, Lowell formed Little Feat after he was booted… apparently the name came from Lowell’s reportedly tiny feet. While I love their eponymous debut I think it might have been a little idiosyncratic for mainstream radio. Their New Orleans-style sound and their line up coalesced around their next few albums, 1972’s Sailin’ Shoes and 1973’s Dixie Chicken. By that time the line up was solidified as original members Lowell George (vocals/guitar), Richie Hayward (drummer, who later played with Robert Plant), Bill Payne (keyboards) and new bass player Kenny Gradney with new members Paul Barrere (guitar) and Sam Clayton (percussion).

While there have been deluxe versions of Sailin’ Shoes and Dixie Chicken prior to Feats Don’t Fail Me Now – Deluxe and while this may seem like an odd place to do my first ever post on Little Feat, people tend to forget Feats Don’t Fail Me… was actually Little Feat’s first gold record. It really is a great album. Truth be told, it was the first Little Feat album I bought. It has some of their most iconic songs, “Spanish Moon,” “Rock N Roll Doctor” and “Oh Atlanta” to name but a few. I love the title track. This album has always been seen as the beginning of Lowell George, who’d run the band in the Zappa autocratic style up to that point, taking a step back and taking a more democratic approach to things within the band. So we get Paul Barrere and Bill Payne singing on a couple of songs and contributing more to the writing. If you check out this Deluxe set for any reason it should be to hear this original album if you haven’t already. Some felt it petered out a little bit by putting a 9-minute medley of two tracks from Sailin’ Shoes, “Cold Cold Cold” and “Tripe Face Boogie” on side two to close out the album. Little Feat often revisited songs that the public ignored on an earlier album and the medley cooks, so I’m okay with it. In my opinion, Feats Don’t Fail Me Now is Little Feat’s last great album.

Disc 2 of the Deluxe sets predominantly features “alternate” versions of tracks from the album. They’re in general a little looser and less polished… a few breakdown before they get the song finished, but it’s all a great listen. “Spanish Moon (Alternate Version)” actually grabbed my ear. There’s also a “Spanish Moon (Single Version)” on the disc for Little Feat completists out there. If there are any such thing as a Little Feat completist… and there should be. There are also alternate versions of a few tracks that appeared in Little Feat’s next few records. “Long Distant Love” with just Lowell and an acoustic guitar and vocal is a real find on this disc. There are a couple of outtakes that I really dig especially “Brickyard Blues.” I wish they’d finished that one. An early version of “All That You Dream” which I think ended up on The Last Record Album is here as well and it’s great as well. There’s also an early version of a song George hated, “Day At The Dog Races” that indulged Payne and Barrere’s penchant for jazz-rock fusion ala the Weather Report. Overall, disc 2 is a great listen.

Disc 3, for me, is where the gold is. It’s an excerpt from a concert from 1975 recorded in Paris (on February 1st of that year). I will warn you that the sound quality is probably a good to very good bootleg quality. That may put some folks off, I get it, but the music is so high quality it overcomes some of the deficits in sound. Admittedly I’ve listened to a lot of boots over the years. Little Feat was nothing if not a road-hardened group of professional musicians. George’s slide is all over this thing. This disc really fills out the picture that we got with Waiting For Columbus. There was tension in the band by this time but it wasn’t as bad as ’78. “On Your Way Down” is a great starting point on the concert. It’s murky and bluesy. “Fat Man In the Bath Tub” is always a delight on any live album. “I hear you moan…I hear you moooooan.” “Rock N Roll Doctor” just rocks but still manages to swing. I’ll take all the live Little Feat I can get my hands on.

Alas, after Feats Don’t Fail Me Now, Lowell began to withdraw from the band and began to lose control of things There were a few more albums – with some great songs sprinkled in – but Little Feat began to become a band in decline. They finally broke up and Lowell died of a heart attack brought on by heroin. At least we have this great Deluxe package to crank up all these years later. I say that Feats Don’t Fail Me Now was my first Little Feat purchase, but if I’m being honest I think I did pick up their reunion album, without Lowell George obviously in 1988, Let It Roll. But like INXS who shouldn’t have carried on without Michael Hutchence, perhaps Little Feat should have continued under a different name. I ended up selling Let It Roll at the used record store… you can’t carry on without Lowell’s distinctive vocals and his great songwriting… it doesn’t make sense. One does not simply replace a Lowell George.

Pour something dark and murky and crank this one up loud. I defy you to not get up out of your easy chair and let your feet shuffle around when you hear this music! Like the man himself says, “If you like country with a boogie beat he’s the man to meet, if you like the sound of shufflin’ feet he can’t be beat…”

Cheers!