Singer/songwriter Paul Pena's "New Train," recorded in 1973, will finally be released Tuesday (Sept. 26) by Hybrid Recordings. Produced by Ben Sidran (Steve Miller, Mose Allison), the album includes guest appearances by the late Jerry Garcia, Merle Saunders, and the Persuasions.
"New Train" includes the original recording of Pena's "Jet Airliner," which later became a hit for Steve Miller, who was given a tape of the album by session drummer Gary Malabar. The album, which also features a cover of Johnny Nash's "Move And Groove," includes newly penned liner notes by Sidran.
The album -- his first for Bearsville Records -- was intended as the follow-up to Pena's 1972 eponymous Capitol debut. Recorded in Boston and San Francisco, the album sports an impressive array of musicians, including Garcia on pedal steel and Saunders on keyboards on two tracks; and a band that featured Sidran on organ and piano, bassist Harvey Brooks, who played on Bob Dylan's "Highway 61 Revisited," and Malabar, who had just finished recording the "Moondance" album with Van Morrison before joining Pena.
Albert Grossman, who signed the artist to Bearsville, did not like the finished album, and wanted it to be re-recorded. Pena, his manager Gunther Weil, and Sidran disagreed, and after much debate, Pena was released from his contract.
Fed up with the music business, the blind Pena gave up recording and moved to San Francisco. He didn't record again commercially until he made a 1994 album of Tuvan throat singing, the language and technique of producing two or three tones simultaneously which he taught himself 10 years earlier.
After befriending Tuvan throat singer Kongar-ol Ondar upon one of his visits to the U.S., Pena was invited to take part in a 1993 competition in Kyzyl, Tuva, where he won his category and stole the "audience favorite" award. His trip was captured on film and became the subject of the 1999 documentary "Genghis Blues," which won a Sundance Film Festival Award and was nominated for an Academy Award. The success of the film is among the factors that led Pena, who is suffering from an unknown and potentially fatal illness, to finally release "New Train."
For more information on Pena, visit his Web site.
<div align="right"><i>-- Barry A. Jeckell, N.Y.</i></div>
"New Train" includes the original recording of Pena's "Jet Airliner," which later became a hit for Steve Miller, who was given a tape of the album by session drummer Gary Malabar. The album, which also features a cover of Johnny Nash's "Move And Groove," includes newly penned liner notes by Sidran.
The album -- his first for Bearsville Records -- was intended as the follow-up to Pena's 1972 eponymous Capitol debut. Recorded in Boston and San Francisco, the album sports an impressive array of musicians, including Garcia on pedal steel and Saunders on keyboards on two tracks; and a band that featured Sidran on organ and piano, bassist Harvey Brooks, who played on Bob Dylan's "Highway 61 Revisited," and Malabar, who had just finished recording the "Moondance" album with Van Morrison before joining Pena.
Albert Grossman, who signed the artist to Bearsville, did not like the finished album, and wanted it to be re-recorded. Pena, his manager Gunther Weil, and Sidran disagreed, and after much debate, Pena was released from his contract.
Fed up with the music business, the blind Pena gave up recording and moved to San Francisco. He didn't record again commercially until he made a 1994 album of Tuvan throat singing, the language and technique of producing two or three tones simultaneously which he taught himself 10 years earlier.
After befriending Tuvan throat singer Kongar-ol Ondar upon one of his visits to the U.S., Pena was invited to take part in a 1993 competition in Kyzyl, Tuva, where he won his category and stole the "audience favorite" award. His trip was captured on film and became the subject of the 1999 documentary "Genghis Blues," which won a Sundance Film Festival Award and was nominated for an Academy Award. The success of the film is among the factors that led Pena, who is suffering from an unknown and potentially fatal illness, to finally release "New Train."
For more information on Pena, visit his Web site.
<div align="right"><i>-- Barry A. Jeckell, N.Y.</i></div>
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