Little Feat – Dixie Chicken

This album entry is for a green label Santa Maria release, just as is the master release for Dixie Chicken. Seems like they should be combined. The only other choice in Discogs is for a green label Terre Haute pressing. My copy is neither of those, but it does not have any visible identifier that can distinguish a pressing plant.

UK cassette not listed slightly different cover layout will post a pic

Just listened again to the Mobile Fidelity against my 1973 Green Warner Bros issue and the MF is just not on the same page, the vocals,guitars,piano andchimes are all playing through soup. Stick to the original if you can, you will be rewarded.....

Blair Finlay

By the time Dixie Chicken splintered my sunlight, Little Feat were deep into their charming smokin’ boogie variation of swamp rock, with an album on which Lowell George gives probably his best performance. The release comes across sounding effortless and tight, full and warm, with George infusing nearly each song with his wry sense of humor.

All this leaves me to wonder why it is that Little Feat have never reached the wider audience they were so deserving of, though perhaps that had something to do with a continual shifting of personnel, with that shifting being noted in the expressions of the material … nevertheless, by the time the album was put to bed, the band had solidified, creating a relentless engagement of both music and verse.

Dixie Chicken is more richly produced, filled more funky and almost danceable rhythms than the slightly more raw Sailin’ Shoes, making it a laid back affair, especially with special guests that included Bonnie Raitt, along with a very lush soulful backup singing. Though the legend of this brilliant classic doesn’t end there, as the incorporation of polyrhythmic tonalities learned from Frank Zappa, mixed with a simmering swagger, reveal themselves and rain down nothing but sheer delight at the most opportune moments.

With a vast array of New Orleans music experiences coming to fruition, Dixie Chicken nearly enters the conceptual level, fusing the album with so many musical variations that it sounds as if it could have been written by some wayfaring tramp-steamer Merchant Marine just back from from circumnavigating the globe.

Dixie Chicken wastes me today as much as it did the first time it sat me down and showed me who was boss.

*** The Fun Facts: The song, and the album’s title was taken from a chicken joint advertising Dixie Chicken down in Laurel Canyon by Martin Kibbee, who wrote the song.

The artwork for the front cover was by illustrator Neon Park and is a reference to a line from the albums's third song, "Roll Um Easy”.

Little Feat intended to title the album Handcuffs & Accordions based on the Neon Parks painting. Then it settle in, realizing that no one’s going to buy an album called Handcuffs and Accordions.

For those of you who wish the best quality, consider that Dixie Chicken was a great choice for a reissue from Mobile Fidelity but something’s gone terribly wrong here sonically. The original production was not exactly a bright tinkly affair either, whoever engineered and mastered it is a mystery, as the crediting is a bit vague. Again, the original does have decent high frequency response, reasonably sharply drawn cymbals, vocals and guitar transients. The Mobile Fidelity reissue is beyond dark, it comes across as thick and dull.  I have no doubt Mobile Fidelity got hold of the master tapes, but this record's top end extension makes it sound as if it was sourced from a cassette played back on a machine with poorly aligned playback heads. You’ll find these same issues on the Waiting For Columbus Mobile High Fidelity (second) reissue, where it also leans toward dark and dull, particularly compared to the original Mobile Fidelity reissue, but one could argue that that one was too bright and too airy as well.

Review by Jenell Kesler