Composer sings his secret heart out

by Keith Spera

Sunday, October 7, 2001 - The Times-Picayune

Judging a songwriter by the company his compositions keep, Tennessee's John Hiatt ranks among the best. Bonnie Raitt resurrected her career with Hiatt's "Thing Called Love." Jewel, Joe Cocker, and Jo-el Sonnier are among the dozen-plus artists who invested some of themselves in his "Have A Little Faith In Me." B.B. King and Eric Clapton chose Hiatt's "Riding With the King" as the title track of their monumental blues summit. Aaron Neville and Buddy Guy embraced his "Feels Like Rain." On Thursday at the House of Blues, Hiatt rendered theses songs in their original voice, with the able assistance of his southwest Louisiana-bred band, The Goners. Hiatt recorded his watershed 1989 album "Slow Turning" with the Goners - guitarist Sonny Landreth, bassist Dave Ranson, and drummer Kenny Blevins - but has employed a variety of musicians on subsequent albums and tours. He finally called up the Goners once again for his new "The Tiki Bar Is Open" CD.

Both "Slow Turning" and "Tiki Bar" merited extra attention Thursday. From "Slow Turning," Hiatt and company alternated the gentle "Feels Like Rain" and "Is Anybody There?" with the hard-charging "Tennessee Plates" and "Drive South." That Hiatt's reunion with Landreth, Ranson, and Blevins invigorated him is evident in the full-throttle "Tiki Bar" burners "Everybody Went Low" and "All the Lilacs in Ohio," both of which took on extra urgency on stage.

The Goners garnished arrangements with extra flourishes, such as the stout Ranson bass riff that served as a counterpoint to Landreth's clarion-call guitar on "Ohio." But mostly they functioned as the star of the evening's roadhouse-worthy backing band. Landreth shied from the sort of six-string fireworks he sets off with his own group; on this gig, his guitar was subservient to Hiatt's songs. Still, he managed to flash some of his trademark heroics. He pealed away a succession of quivering, elongated slide guitar tones and controlled feedback as an introduction to "Memphis in the Meantime," a set highlight.

But this was Hiatt's night. Alone at a keyboard for an encore of "Have A Little Faith in Me," he testified like a gospel preacher with a clenched voice that sounded weathered, but unbowed, after a long passage through the dark to arrive in the light. He sang of a "secret heart" that "cannot speak so easily." Hiatt's ability to give that secret heart a voice by way of rugged, articulate, and accessible songs is his greatest gift.