Lenny McDaniel is a good singer, an excellent instrumentalist (especially on
guitar), and a producer of major-label ability. What he does best, however,
is write, and since New Orleans can use all the songwriters it can get these
days, that makes him an especially valuable commodity. This solo CD, his seventh
since returning to the Crescent City after years as an El Lay sessionman, doesn’t
quite live up to the “Quintessential Rhythm and Blues for the New Millennium” tag
plastered all over it. It is, however, one of the better soul-blues albums
you’ll hear this year. And that ain’t hay.

You won’t find any great lyrical insights in Two Sides, which, like a
lot of recent releases from his peers, casts a jaundiced eye at the state of
the post-9/11 world. Unless you weren’t aware that some ghetto kids are “Armed & Dangerous” or
that the world could use more “Love & Understandin’,” that
is. But who cares, especially when Lenny demonstrates his flair for the pop-soul
hook on the kind of sentiments everyone can get into, like on the best track
here, “Range Of Emotions.” When he laments, “It gave you
power when you made me cry,” it’s easy to see why he’s represented
by one of the largest music publishers in the country.

As for the finished product, McDaniel returns to his blue-eyed soul roots on “Two
Sides,” eschewing his recent forays into straight blues and Latin music.
For someone on that rare New Orleans—Los Angeles axis, he has a lot of
Memphis in him, and although it comes out more naturally through his axe than
his throat (dig the way he overextends himself vocally on the opening title
track), it’s as genuine as polished, professional product like this gets.
Lenny McDaniel may be better known to industry types than housewives, but it’s
not for lack of talent. Or, for that matter, sincerity.