Powell St. John is a name well known to the aficionados of the Austin music scene, especially those who are familiar with the long history of our musical heritage. He was a part of almost every important phase during the evolution of Austin’s distinct sound since he started entertaining local crowds in the early 1960’s. He was a central figure in the folk sound that arose near the University of Texas campus back then, and was one of the founding members of the famed "Waller Creek Boys".

He was exposed to the blues and expanded his sound into that musical genre and teamed up with a young woman from Port Arthur named Janis Joplin; they played together around town and finally settled down to mostly play at the filling station on North Lamar run by a singer of Texas country blues named Kenneth Threadgill. It was during her time playing with Powell St. John that Janis evolved her unique style and soon moved to San Francisco to start her rise to fame. He was here in Austin and was present at the formation of the Thirteenth Floor Elevators, a legendary psychedelic band that performed several of his songs before they quickly, and sadly, burned out too soon. He then followed Janis to San Francisco, as did many Austinites like Jack Jackson, who published the first Underground Comic of the Hippie era in the basement of the Texas Capitol Building and was the art director of the Family Dog out there. It was there in San Francisco in the late 1960’s that Powell St. John met Tracy Nelson and, with her, formed a band called Mother Earth that is still talked about today.

That was how this man started out.

And today, I just listened to the latest offering for Powell St. John, a 2-disc CD that encompasses his sound from his early years to the mature sound that he now puts forth and the musicians and vocalists behind him are stellar. Its sound glistens and shows the decades of the evolution of this unique performer that Austin is fortunate enough to call one of our performers. The production values provided by Fred Mitchim are crisp and tight.

The first cut on Disc 1 is a nice and complex choice that kicks things off nicely. The guitar work on songs of his such as "I, the Fly" and "Hermanita" is sweet to listen to. Austin’s Maryann Price (who rose to fame singing with Dan Hicks and His Hot Licks) shares vocals with Powell on "Hermanita" and "Livin’ ‘With the Animals", the biggest hit of Mother Earth. The final cut on Disc 1 is the title track, "Right Track Now" is one of the strongest offerings on the CD; the steel guitar mingling with the electric guitar on this cut is a sweet counterpoint to the mingling of the voices of Powell with Roky Erickson…its makes for a strong finish, with Roky’s voice tempering the rougher toned vocals of Powell.

Disc 2 is dominated by the songs that Powell wrote and were performed by the Thirteenth Floor Elevators. These songs reunite John Ike Walton and Ron Leatherman, the drummer and bass players for the Elevators, who play the rhythm section like their old group had never broken up. Leonard Smith plays the electric jug, a sound pioneered by Tommy Hall of the Elevators back in the 1960’s, and updates the riffs by providing his own signature bubbling runs up and down the musical ladder. My only complaint about this CD set is that I would have liked to have Smith’s sound turned up a smidge higher in the final mix. The final cut on Disc 2 features a wonderful interplay between Spenser Perskin’s violin and Riley Osborne’s keyboards. Older Austinites will recognize these two musicians as men that regularly played the Armadillo World Headquarters during most of the 1970’s

From the cover art to the final cut of the second disc, this is an excellent artistic package with everything about it provided by Austin artists. This would make a wonderful gift for anyone that knows and appreciated Austin music since it covers the spectrum of the best Austin music has produced for more than the last forty years.