Christopher Priest's novel ""The Prestige"" demonstrates the importance of showmanship in entertainment. Although Le Professeur de Magie created a magic trick to trump all magic tricks, he lacked the presentation to garner the appropriate level of acclaim. Meanwhile, The Great Danton could not perform the magic trick, but he could enrapture a theater with his performance. Le Professeur de Magie failed to garner the mass praise his illusion deserved because most magic fans were preoccupied with the display put on by The Great Danton. This distinction is often overlooked in music, yet it is hardly more obvious than on J.J. Cale's Roll On.
Having released his own work steadily since 1971, Cale is still recognized as the pen behind Eric Clapton's ""After Midnight"" and ""Cocaine."" Mostly because of the fact that, despite being an obviously capable songwriter, his shortcomings continue to come through in his performance.
Roll On skips back and forth over the line between B.B. King and Steely Dan, usually landing somewhere around easy-listening jazz. The lead track, ""Who Knew,"" presents a smooth, club-jazz number that, for whatever reason, works well. His guitar musicianship peeks through the steady rumble in a modest, but effective manner.
Nowadays, comparisons to Tom Waits have become a cop-out for journalists unable to get a handle of a songwriter's eccentricities, but his syncopated vocals over a half-plodding, half-marching piano on ""Former Me"" brings few other artists to mind.
Unfortunately, the meat of the album that follows the opening track falls into a lull before being saved by ""Fonda-Lina."" On this track, Cale's best Donald Fagen impression coincidentally drives his most interesting track. His gruff voice doesn't evoke the same effect as Steely Dan, which negates the music's smoothness at times, but it's still an enticing alternative to an otherwise struggling blues album.
On certain tracks, Cale's guitar playing becomes too machinistic. He rhythmically strums the guitar, but fails to provide the usual dynamic quirks that indicate an emotional discharge. His vocals are even more monotonous, leaving him sounding like a less confident Mark Lanegan, who hits every note but misses every sentiment. The monotony of his blues would be unbearable if not for his ability to vary styles.
These complaints, however, could possibly be chocked up as self-indulgent impositions of a specific paradigm in music. And even though he will never bleed through his instrument like Ray Charles, he can certainly jam with the best of them. For example, when he lets his blues roots take over on ""Roll On"" and ""Oh Mary,"" he really sounds like he belongs on stage next to Clapton.
But that one sentiment is Cale's biggest pitfall. Instead of forging an image for himself, he sounds like he's merely trying to belong with his more commercially successful contemporaries. Although he wrote a number of beautiful compositions, the emotional void in his delivery ultimately restrains him from widespread acclaim. So while other contemporaries and blues aficionados will laud him for his incredible songwriting, the rest of us will be content waiting for the next Clapton album.
