The critics dig "Last Fool Here"
and you will too!

BLUE SUEDE NEWS
#73  Winter 2005/2006, Page 44

This delightful release by Washington DC area musician J.P. McDermott is a wonderful reminder that good music can be exciting without the hyper and over the top antics so many Rockabilly bands require as a main element. J.P. McDermott creates a musically varied album with songs that are bouncy, rockin' and boppin', soulful, melodic and sad - sometimes all at once. Everything from the hottest rockers (his own "My Damn Baby", "That Ain't Nothin' But Right, and "Sixteen Chicks") to cool Carl Perkins' style boppers ("Go Cat Go"), a stroll with bluesy guitar work ("Do I Love You") to Honky Tonk ballads (Harlan Howard's classic "Heartaches For A Dime" - one of many examples why J.P. McDermott was voted Country Vocalist of the year by the local Music Association).Truly a classic is his own "Last Fool Here", a soulful piano led Country waltz/ballad with sparse, tasteful instrumentation that sounds like it could have been a hit for Charlie Rich in the 60s. Every song here is a winner, his renditions of "Cry Cry Cry" and "Blue Days, Black Nights" are marvelous, his own powerful stroll "Coulda Shoulda Woulda" should become a dance floor hit in the Rockabilly scene, "Lucky Stars" has rumba groove and the original ballad "Not Enough Of You" was recorded with a Ricky Nelson / "Lonesome Town" feel. The CD is just over half an hour long, but that's no drawback if you consider how well everything here comes together, fantastic sound and musicianship, excellent, memorable song choices, fine artwork. Make yourself a Christmas present!   www.westernbop.com.

MUSIC MONTHLY
January 2006, Page 8

What do you get when you combine the best parts of honky tonk and classic country music with a dash of the fun rockabilly sound for a little seasoning? If you live in the greater Washington, D.C. area, the answer is J.P. McDermott and Western Bop.

McDermott and company are part of a local country music scene that strives to keep alive the different sounds of traditional country music instead of focusing on the radio friendly sound of the commercial country music that comes out of Nashville.  McDermott and artists like Honky Tonk Confidential, Ty Braddock and the Branded Men, Ruthie and The Wranglers and J.B. Beverley and The Wayward Drifters are at the forefront of the music and are responsible for keeping alive traditional country sounds in the area.

After one listen to Last Fool Here, the new CD from McDermott and his band, it is easy to see why he was the winner of the "Best Country Vocalist" award from the Washington Area Music Association. McDermott has a voice custom-made for the music he plays, filled with a whole lot of rockabilly swagger and just enough country twang to keep him honest.

McDermott's voice, along with the solid and reliable instrumental work of the guys in Western Bop, is on display throughout the 12 tracks on Last Fool Here, from the uptempo rocker "My Damn Baby" that starts the album down to the somber barroom blues of "Last Fool Here" that fittingly brings this affair to a conclusion.

The original compositions on the album like "Not Enough for You" and "Last Fool Here" fit nicely with familiar covers like "Blue Days, Black Nights" and Johnny Cash's "Cry Cry Cry," to form an entertaining and cohesive album.  With a Wammie award on his shelf and a hot new album in-hand, the future looks good for J.P.  McDermott and Western Bop -- don't be surprised if you hear more about them when the next round of WAMA award nominations are announced...

THE WASHINGTON POST
Friday, January 6, 2006; Page WE11 

NO, YOU WON'T find the ghosts of Bob Wills and Charlie Parker collaborating when J.P. McDermott and Western Bop step onstage. But if the band's debut CD is any indication, you may hear the gates of honky-tonk heaven swing open now and then.

A vintage term for hardcore country and rockabilly sounds, "western bop," as defined by McDermott here, is all about unvarnished ballads and unfettered spirit. Echoes of Buddy Holly, Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins, Roy Orbison, Wynn Stewart and many of their lesser-known contemporaries resound throughout this 12-song collection, along with classic Chuck Berry double stop guitar riffs and some low-end, Luther Perkins-inspired twang. All the while, McDermott gets a big assist from guitarist Bob Newscaster and other local musicians well versed in rockabilly rhythms and honky-tonk tales.

After opening up with "My Damn Baby," an original tune that comes across as a convulsive tribute to Sun Records' Billy Lee Riley, McDermott and company conjure a trove of analog sounds: Cash is saluted with a chugging reprise of "Cry Cry Cry." Holly is remembered by the relatively obscure ballad "Blue Days, Black Nights." Orbison's popera flair is evoked when McDermott caps "Not Enough of You," another original tune, with a dramatic flourish.

In addition to having a voice versatile enough to pull off these songs, McDermott is the sort of tunesmith who knows how to put a lost soul in his place. For proof, look no further than the title cut, a barroom blues that concerns "the last fool here at closing and the first fool to show tomorrow night."

WASHINGTON CITYPAPER
ONE TRACK MIND - What's new in the local scene a few minutes at a time
Feb 17 - 23, 2006, Page 41

STANDOUT TRACK: No. 12, "Last Fool Here," a mournful country ballad that captures that bittersweet last-call mood. "I've been down on that floor," sings the Silver Spring-based McDermott, 45. "I've been thrown out that door/Still, I'll be the last fool here."

MUSICAL MOTIVATION: "I wasn't trying to make a CD-I was trying to make a record," explains McDermott of the disc "Last Fool Here" closes. "It sorta has a Side A and a Side B. It's not like a concept record, but I wanted people to know, This is it-it's over. And it's a song about the end of the night."

A band spends hours "creating an atmosphere" in a club, McDermott says. "Then the atmosphere changes dramatically. They start sweeping up and putting up the chairs and turning on the lights."

3/4 ON THE FLOOR: The song had been recorded several times since McDermott wrote it in 2001-but never successfully. "I had it as a straight, Ray Price-type shuffle," he says. "I tried it as a rockabilly song. I tried it Blasters-style. It never worked." Appropriately, inspiration struck around closing time: "I suddenly realized, at 3 o'clock in the morning, That song is a waltz!"

Even then, recordings with McDermott's regular band came up short. So he hired a jazz trio for the album version-even though country music, he says, "throws jazz guys for a loop." The result, McDermott notes with approval, is "tension in the piano part." "He's having to think through the whole song," he says, "because it's so simple."

TAKOMA VOICE and SILVER SPRING VOICE
December 2005
http://www.takoma.com/archives/copy/2005/12/CDs.html

I'm going to try really hard not to compare J.P. McDermott to Elvis, since I'm sure that everyone compares him to Elvis. And it's true-that lip-twitching twang is all over the Western Bop sound. But J.P. is also in possession of a good ole tenor of his very own, and as a fine honky-tonk songwriter, he's got a leg up on the Nashville gang. There's plenty of stuff on Last Fool Here that swings on its own merits. "Lucky Stars" has hints of Mexican waltz, "Blue Days, Black Nights" is sock-hop hip, and "Sixteen Chicks" is a 48-speed good time. But the gem here is the title track-the CD's last call, which uses soft piano to profile the heartbroken loner who closes down the bar. Don't behead me, but this McDermott original is more authentic than anything the King ever borrowed.

ROCKABILLY BABE
http://www.rockabillybabe.com
December 27, 2005

Last Fool Here takes off with blinding force using My Damn Baby as the runway.  My Damn Baby is an upbeat, fast-paced rockabilly thumper and only the beginning force of this monstrous album.  Red hot rockabilly and vintage honky tonk is not enough of a definition to describe J.P. McDermott and Western Bop.  Sure they are all of the above, but they do it in such a professional and classic way, that my ears were like a virgin. 

I'm going to steal a paragraph from their website to help me sum up what is one of the best neo-vintage rockabilly albums I've ever heard.  "Back before they called it rock and roll they called it Western Bop.  In '55, the first time anyone called Elvis a King, they were calling him The King of Western Bop.  Buddy Holly's first business card advertised "Western & Bop".  Western Bop is where it all comes together -- Rockabilly, Classic Country, and Vintage Honky Tonk.  Western Bop is a flattop acoustic beating time like a big eight-wheeler comin' down the track. It's a bass fiddle getting slapped like there's no tomorrow. Throw in a stinging lead guitar, and you know you've found the right place". Nothing sums up J.P. McDermott and Western Bop like that paragraph.  The roster goes as follows: drummer Tom Bowes, doghouse-ist Louie Newmyer, guitarist Bob Newscaster, plus the thunderous voice and acoustic hammerings of J.P. McDermott.

On with the show, Johnny Cash is smiling in sheer adulation over their cover of Cry, Cry, Cry.   The acoustic sound added in with McDermott's steady, relaxing voice is a Grammy winner.  Coulda Shoulda Woulda picks up the pace as a rockabilly standard about missing out on what could have been.  Bob Newscaster's exhibition on lead guitar drives the Bop's retro, rockabilly sound.  The pace drops to a slow swinging tempo as Not Enough of You takes over the airwaves.  "I've had enough of loneliness, but not enough of you," McDermott describes in a honky tonk, heart broken wail.

There are several covers including Blue Days, Black Nights and Sixteen Chicks that are done in the utmost way.  J.P. McDermott and Western Bop have a way of presenting even the songs you know and love with a breath of fresh air.  This especially holds true as Sixteen Chicks pounds though the speakers.  I've heard this song several times by several bands, but never has it hit like a ton of lead like this version does.

My favorite track Go Cat Go!, written by guitarist Newscaster, also holds my favorite line, "Parking lot full of kustom cars, tattooed chicks dressed like movie stars".  This song sums up the Kuston Kulture.  Go Cat Go! is a definite rockabilly staple driven by the fill-in upright sounds of Bryan Smith and fill-in drummer Jeff Lodson.  It has the backbone and balls of a 10-foot greaser.  That Ain't Nothing But Right keeps the vintage upbeat rockabilly alive in a song about nothing that feels so good could be wrong.

All good things must come to an end.  This retro-ride winds down with Last Fool Here.  This downtrodden tribute to loneliness brings the empty feelings that we've all had in a night spent sulking in our favorite honky tonk.  "I know all the bar maids and the jukebox songs by heart, I've been down on that floor, I've been thrown out that door," McDermott cries.

I've been moved by only a few albums and this is one of them.  I was so moved that we talked them in to doing Rockabilly Night on January 14th @ Puckett's.

Do yourself a favor and pick up your copy of Last Fool Here at J.P. McDermott and Western Bop's website and don't miss them live!

BLACKCAT ROCKABILLY
October 2005
http://www.rockabilly.nl/reviews/jpmcdermott.htm

5 Stars - Recommended

I've just finished listening several times to this new J.P. McDermott CD and let me say right away, it rocks. The first song, "My Damn Baby",is damn fine song to start off with, an itsy bitsy raunchy, foottapping rocker you expect to hear in a truckstop roadhouse. My kinda song so to speak.

next track "Do I love You" continues this mood. Greasy, bluesy and a steady beat. Than J.P..'s interpretation of Johnny Cash's "Cry, Cry, Cry" pleases me very much, and I think it would please mr. Cash as well. "Coulda Shoulda Woulda" takes me back to the beerjoint. Great rocker tune, with a cool mix of trashy distortion guitar and a twangy Dixie guitar.

"Not Enough For You" brings up the first real chance for J.P. McDermott to demonstrate that he also is an old fashioned crooner in the great tradition of the Big "O", and like him, J.P. is capable to put all his pain and broken heart into his voice. Than a rendition of Buddy Holly's "Blue Days Black Nights" with razor sharp vocal harmonies, completed with a groovin' slapbass. To be honest, not entirely my taste, but I 'd give it an A+ for musicality. Another real treat is "Lucky Stars", a catchy Tex-mex tune in a greasy Buddy Holly sauce, pay attention to that guitarsolo and enjoy!

"Sixteen Chicks" is a rockabilly bopper of the purest kind. Dancefloor alert! The rest of this CD is equally strong, but you should listen and decide that for yourself. For me this CD is worth 5 stars, no doubt about that! J.P. McDermott delivers a mighty fine addition for the entire roots genre.

Do you know anyone who can translate some reviews for us?  We've got some in Swedish and Belgian Dutch that we can't really read.  Drop us a line at info@westernbop.com.  Thanks in advance!