Reviews

"They don't write lyrics like 'I'm satisfied, satisfied, my todalo shaker by my side' anymore. Then again, who plays jug band music (that's a line from the Memphis Jug Band's "You May Leave but This Will Bring You Back") anymore?

Well, fast on the heels of two important reissues -- a Jim Kweskin and His Jug Band compilation, Acoustic Swing and Jug, and Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions (with Jerry Garcia, Bob Weir, and Pigpen) -- comes this CD of authentic party music from the 1920's and '30's, recorded in a Berkeley living room by a Bay Area-Mendocino-Seattle quintet featuring Suzy Thompson, Eric Thompson, Steven Strauss, Frannie Leopold, and W.B. Reid. Acoustic guitars, mandolins, fiddles, bowed bass, and banjo plink, plunk, careen and moan while everybody pitches in vocals. Bluegrass, Cajun, blues, swing, and string band virtuosos playing vintage music just for fun? What a concept. What a blast." Derk Richardson, The Guardian

"Taking their inspiration and most of their repertoire from the early jug and string bands and blues singers who played up and down Beale Streeet in Memphis in the 1920s and '30s, the Todalo Shakers make a joyful and infectious noise whether singing songs like "On the Road Again" and "Prison Wall Blues", or vamping through instrumentals like "Dallas Rag." Featuring veteran West Coast musicians Suzy and Eric Thompson,W.B. Reid, Frannie Leopold and Steven Strauss, the Shakers provide an irresistible blend of harmony, swing and stomp." Mike Regenstreif, SingOut! Magazine

"The black string-band tradition has been potential fertile ground for old-time musicians to explore for some time but there has been precious little done in this vein. Finally a band has recorded a killer set of blues, rags, slow drags, early swing and jug band favorites. The Todalo Shakers rivals Jim Kweskin's band of 30 years ago for getting into and exploring the possibilities of this rich music. At the core of this band are two fo the grooviest funksters in the old-time scene: Eric and Suzy Thompson. They funky things up real nice. You could say the whole band is really "down with this music." Suzy plays some fiddle so sleazy that it will make your speakers sizzle. Eric plays as much mandolin as lead guitar and he really struts his stuff on both. He gets into a nice raggy groove on "Mandolin King Rag." Suzy's fiddle shadows the mandolin and W.B. Reid's banjo-guitar provides the right amount of chunky funk.

Suzy Thompson's vocals are full out and fine. When she sings it stays sung. Her harmony vocals with Frannie Leopold are right on. Her lead vocals call something deep inside and she shows us what singing is all about. One listen to "One Black Rat" shows off Suzy's vocal with a great harmony from Frannie. On cut after cut, these women know it, got it, and sing it with joy and a nearly unbridled enthusiasm. W.B. Reid is playing some sleazy fiddle on this cut that careens on the brink. Great stuff.

With all of this other great music going on the band still captures the great drive of the best old-time bands. Cuts like "Polecat Blues" and "Ruth's Rag", a great tune that will especially please those included to the raggier approach to our music drive with the best of them.

This is a very strong release and it is highly recommended to all fans of old-time,blues, and jug band music. Although they claim to have gotten their band name from "You May Leave, But This Will Bring You Back," for me it was the words and voice of the late Mississippi John Hurt that came to mind immediately singing, "I'm a todalo shaker..." Either way, they sure know how to shake it up." Bob Buckingham, the Old-Time Herald