Tom Russell Tips Hat To 'Nina Simone' On Epic Noir Album 'Blood And Candle Smoke,' Out September 15, 2009

Nashville, TN (Top40 Charts/ Shore Fire Media) - The song "Nina Simone," from the new album 'Blood and Candle Smoke' (September 15 / Shout! Factory), recounts Tom Russell's first exposure to the legendary vocalist, hearing her interpretation of Dylan's "Just Like a Woman" while in Mexico.

He writes on his blog, "San Cristobal de las Casas. Deep in the Mexican Yucatan. I'm wandering through the colonial backstreets and dark Indian alleys, when I hear Nina Simone's voice filtering out of the window of a used bookstore. Vinyl. An old tube-driven record player. She was singing Dylan's 'Just Like a Woman.' A transforming moment. Those moments when you hear through to the poetics of the song. Down into the bedrock, where the iron water seeps through the veins and soaks into the words."

"She was an angry woman, but contrary to journalistic belief, it didn't all have to do with her blackness or her womanliness... It was a fathomless spiritual anger that strangled and confused her, and allowed her to inject the riveting, jagged noir nuances into the music."