Wonder Wheel

1	Come When I Call You 4:21
2	Mermaid's Avenue 4:29
3	Headdy Down 4:01
4	Gonna Get Through This World 4:02
5	Pass Away 4:26
6	Holy Ground 4:20
7	Goin' Away to Sea 3:45
8	From Here on In 2:56
9	Wheel of Life 5:23
10	Condorbird 3:26
11	Orange Blossom Ring 3:37
12	Heaven 6:08

Barnes & Noble

Who knew that America's Dust Bowl troubadour was such a Brooklyn boychik? Woody Guthrie settled with his second wife, Marjorie Mazia, and their burgeoning family on Mermaid Avenue in Coney Island (a fact well known to Billy Bragg and Wilco fans after their album of unreleased Guthrie tunes) and threw himself into the Jewish, Italian, and Polish neighborhood mix. "Mermaid's Avenue" a gustatory celebration of the street where "the lox and bagels meet" shows how Woody had become a consummate New Yorker by 1950. It's just one glimpse of the second half of the life of the storied song collector and songwriter, gleaned from Guthrie's thousands of unrecorded songs and painted in luminous color by the Klezmatics and guest vocalist Susan McKeown. However much he loved his wife, Guthrie also felt a special bond with his mother-in-law, Aliza Greenblatt, a Yiddish labor activist and songwriter. The songs here burst with fascist-fighting immigrant struggles for a perfect world; in its own way it's as rich and earthy and multitudinous as Walt Whitman. The music is a perfect match. Klezmer fans have always known the musical prowess of this ensemble, but never has one album so captured the breadth of their talents: Mandolin-driven folk, Caribbean lilts, klezmer-tinged sea chanteys, Celtic balladry, and gorgeous compositional moments grace the album, with guitarist Boo Reiners adding extra depth. Lorin Sklamberg, a Yiddish-song treasure, sings in English, delivering note-perfect readings of Guthrie's lyrics, often in ethereal harmony with McKeown. The instant classic "Mermaid's Avenue" should raise a generation of Boardwalk babies, but then there's the luminous "Gonna Get Through This World," the Eastern-tinged "Holy Ground," and the Eastern European/avant-jazz/liturgical exploration "Wheel of Life." It's hard to pick favorites from this carnival of seaside fun. Together they make a richly satisfying nosh, easily the Klezmatics' most accessible album, and a riotous slice of life that might have, must have, been. Mark Schwartz

All Music Guide

Wonder Wheel isn't the first album created from completed but never recorded lyrics left behind by the late folk icon Woody Guthrie. In 1998 the British folk-punk singer Billy Bragg and American roots rockers Wilco jointly recorded Mermaid Avenue, which drew from the same pool of material. It was successful enough that a second volume was released two years later. In fact, Wonder Wheel isn't even the first time the Klezmatics have turned to Guthrie's leftovers for inspiration. In 2004, they issued Woody Guthrie's Happy Joyous Hanuka, which, like Wonder Wheel, found the musicians taking Guthrie's words -- which he'd never set to music -- and fashioning from them new compositions that adapted readily to their style. Significantly, the Klezmatics, like the Bragg/Wilco project, chose not to attempt writing as if they were '40s dust-bowl troubadours, but rather to place the poet's words into a contemporary folk-roots setting. That's what makes Wonder Wheel -- the title, incidentally, refers to the beautiful old wooden ferris wheel that has been part of the Brooklyn jewel that is Coney Island, NY, where Guthrie lived for several years on, you guessed, it, Mermaid Avenue -- such a complete joy. Also significant is that some of the interpretations on Wonder Wheel bear little resemblance to the klezmer music that has always (and obviously) defined the Klezmatics, and that all of the songs are sung in English, not the group's more customary language, Yiddish. Those decisions, naturally, make Wonder Wheel a more accessible Klezmatics album. The track "Mermaid's Avenue," for example -- curiously, neither of the Bragg/Wilco Mermaid Avenue volumes actually included the song -- might just as easily have worked on a Jonathan Richman record, with its playful lyrics ("Mermaid Avenue that's the street/Where the lox and bagels meet") and minimalist arrangement and instrumentation. Some songs lean closer to Celtic ("From Here On In," beautifully sung by guest vocalist Susan McKeown and chorus) and traditional folk ("Holy Ground") than anything in the Jewish canon, while "Condorbird" is punctuated with a horn chart that neatly peppers its quasi-klezmer rhythm with a southwestern accent. Lyrically, the Klezmatics choose to showcase as wide a range of Guthrie's interests as possible, from the vehemently antiwar "Come When I Call You" and "Goin' Away to Sea" to the children's song "Headdy Down" and the hopeful, optimistic "Heaven" and "Wheel of Life." Each of the bandmembers turns in exemplary performances here but the versatile lead vocalist Lorin Sklamberg is due for special consideration: the purity of his singing, and his acute sensitivity to the words he sings, is the chief reason that Guthrie's lyrics are transformed from dust-gatherers to living, breathing, vital pieces of music. Woody's Jewish in-laws would certainly have been proud. Jeff Tamarkin

Billboard

The band confounds expectations...The Klezmatics prove themselves to be sensitive interpreters of any artistic language they choose.

Blender

Clarinets can rock...Guthrie would have plotzed to hear the melodies Lorin Sklamberg and company provide.