EP133: Remembering Bill Withers with Joey Dosik

Episode notes

(This episode originally aired 03/28/2019) 

The Album: Bill Withers: +Justments (1974)

Despite the massive success of Withers’s first two albums, Just As I Am and Still Bill, label problems prevented +Justments (his fourth LP) from being released on CD until 2010. As such, it’s been a sleeper of an album despite how good it is. Withers was never the most confessional of artists but this album, which came about during the dissolution of Withers’s marriage to Denise Nicholas (amidst accusations of abuse), is about as close to he gets to talking about his personal life via song. Meanwhile, scoring all this were former members of the Watts 103rd St. Rhythm Band, as good a rhythm section that any artist in L.A. could hope to be hooked up with.

+Justments was the pick by L.A. soulster Joey Dosik, who’s recorded extensively with Vulfpeck but has recently branched into his solo career with his debut album from last year, Inside Voice, which includes a cover of “Stories” from Withers’s album. Amongst other things, we discussed how Dosik discovered this slept-on album in his ex-girlfriend’s crates, how he learned his own singing voice by studying Withers’s, and how drumming great James Gadson is supernaturally clean in the pocket.

Note: the first half of our episode was taped in the MaxFun kitchen on a remote rig because the power had gone out in our building. We were able to get back into the studio properly for the second half but we apologize for the uneven sound quality of the first half.

More on Joey Dosik

• “Joey Dosik Talks NBA-Inspired ‘Running Away’ & Getting A Pep Talk From Quincy Jones” (Billboard)
• Interview with Atwood Magazine
• Twitter | Bandcamp | Website

More on +Justments

• Bomani Jones on +Justments.
• Review on Popmatters.
• “Ain’t No Sunshine In Bill Withers’ Masterpiece, +’Justments” (Trunkworthy)

Show Tracklisting (all songs from +Justmentsunless indicated otherwise):

• Ruby Lee
• Joey Dosik: Game Winner
• Stories
• Bill Withers: Ain’t No Sunshine
• Can We Pretend
• Heartbreak Road
• Can We Pretend
• Heartbreak Road
• Stories
• Joey Dosik: Stories (Live)
• Joey Dosik: Stories
• Railroad Man
• You
• Green Grass
• Ruby Lee
• Shuggie Otis: Inspiration Information
• Stevie Wonder: Visions

Here is the Spotify playlist of as many songs as we can find there

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