Category Archives: Americana

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“They Called It Music” by the Gibson Brothers

The Gibson Brothers
They Called It Music
Compass Records
5 stars (out of 5)

By Donald Teplyske

At a time when select Americana labels seldom release a bluegrass album, Compass Records is coming to the fore as a consistent source of good bluegrass: the Special Consensus, Dale Ann Bradley and Larry Stephenson, of course, but also Peter Rowan, Frank Solivan & Dirty Kitchen, Rebecca Frazier, the Bankesters, and Claire Lynch… the new releases keep coming.

The Gibson Brothers joined the Compass fold a couple albums back, and since that time have rapidly built upon the foundation they established recording with Hay Holler and Sugar Hill. Each of the album’s I’ve heard from the Gibson Brothers has had much to recommend it, but there comes the time where a new album from almost any superior bluegrass band is met with a bit of a shrug. We tend to take our “stars” a bit for granted, expecting every album to be “great,” whatever that means.

Maybe I’m only speaking for myself, but I suspect I’m not.

By near any measure, the Gibson Brothers are at the pinnacle of the bluegrass world. They are the reigning International Bluegrass Music Association Entertainers of the Year, and have picked up a handful of awards from that organization the past three years. At various times, they have topped the most significant bluegrass charts- Bluegrass Unlimited, Bluegrass Today, and Bluegrass Music Profiles.

They Called It Music is pretty darned fabulous. One cannot accuse the Gibsons of resting on their laurels; they continue to push themselves toward producing stronger, more varied music, recording songs that they have spent time uncovering, as well as more than a few they’ve written themselves. The gentler, songwriter-type songs are adroitly mixed with catchier radio numbers, a pair of which—”Buy A Ring, Find a Preacher” and the title track—are frontloaded.

No two songs can be confused, and the album’s closing number, an Eric Gibson composition entitled “Songbird’s Song” is incomparable; transcending bluegrass while strengthening its definition, this one may prove timeless.

There is no mistaking the vocal intensity of the Gibson Brothers, and on They Called It Music the emphasis on harmony is as palatable as ever. Leigh Gibson, the younger brother, has a smooth, pleasing voice while the Eric’s is higher, more piercing and Del-like: lovely, that.

No matter which is singing, it sounds real good. Leigh’s finest of many lead turns may be on a terrific new song from Joe Newberry, “The Darker the Night, the Better I See;” this barstool anthem is pitiful and blue—absolutely beautiful. I was gobsmacked from the moment he sang, “I’ve honky tonked most all my life,  my day begins at the edge of night.”  Leigh also takes the lead on his brother’s “Dusty Old World,” a song that contains the album’s cleverest line: “My heart’s a loyal hound and when love it’s found, it won’t leave your side once its tracked you down.”

Meanwhile, Eric shines when singing Mark Knopfler’s “Daddy’s Gone to Knoxville” and the title track, a song that emphasizes artificial labels are less important than the music itself. Reno & Smiley’s (and the Paisleys’, and Cowboy Copas’)  “Sundown and Sorrow” serves as a fine snippet of what the Gibson Brother’s sound is all about—yesterday’s classic lines within a sleek outfit designed for today.

The duo return to Shawn Camp on this album. Written with Loretta Lynn, “Dying For Someone to Live For” flat out stops time; this one could go on repeat for an hour without bother. As well, with Camp the brothers wrote the reflectively sentimental “Something Comin’ to Me”, a song made more personal to the co-writers with the addition of lyrics in honour of their passed father.

Their band had been stable until the recent departure of Joe Walsh, who plays mandolin throughout this album. Walsh’s contributions to the album are obvious, and I appreciated his playing several times, including on “Dying For Someone To Live For” and his gentle kick-off to “Home On The River.” Fiddler Clayton Campbell lays out sweetness at every opportunity (as on the album’s lead song) while co-producer and bassist Mike Barber appears to be in for life considering how long he’s been part of the family; his exploration of deep tones is much appreciated within “Something Comin’ to Me” and “Home On The River.”

A masterful recording, this eleventh one from The Gibson Brothers. If it ever did, it should no longer matter from which state they originate, or whether their family roots are entwined with Kentucky grass. The Gibson Brothers know bluegrass like few others, and they perform it as enthusiastically and professionally as the finest in the business. Indeed, an argument could be made that, with this album, they demonstrate that they are the finest in the business.

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“Old Sock” by Eric Clapton & “Electric” by Richard Thompson

Eric Clapton
Old Sock
Surfdog Records
1 star (out of 5)

Richard Thompson
Electric
New West Records
5 stars (out of 5)

By Aaron Keith Harris

Eric Clapton’s place as the godfather of rock guitarists is undisputed—of course because of his brilliant early work, but also because he seems like a nice guy who has outlived greater talents like Hendrix and Duane Allman—but as a solo artist his work has been erratic, reaching a new low with the fittingly—and frighteningly—named Old Sock. All of the adjectives it brings to mind apply to this 12-track, 53-minute set that nearly put me to sleep on a recent road trip.

There are only two new songs here—more about them later—and the remaining 10 are don’t seem to have been chosen for any other reason that the minimal effort they required. A folksy “Goodnight, Irene” and a syrupy “Born to Lose” (from Ray Charles’ country and western phase) would be bad enough, but tossing in three chestnuts from the so-called Great American Songbook in as well, all with shimmering strings and Roy Conniff-style backing vocals, is just painful, surpassing even the dreck that Rod Stewart has been shoveling for the last decade or so.

“Further on Down the Road” (Jesse Davis/Taj Mahal), “Till Your Well Runs Dry” (Peter Tosh), and “Your One and Only Man” (Otis Redding) sound like faux-reggae rejects from the 461 Ocean Boulevard sessions, while the late British blue guitarist Gary Moore’s “Still Got the Blues” is most assuredly devoid of any trace of the purported blues. A soft arrangement, a lazy vocal, and a brief guitar solo that could have been pieced together from three or four other solos from different songs just doesn’t cut it.

Neither of the new songs did Clapton write. “Gotta Get Over” almost comes to life, but not quite. It’s a decent song, with a decent vocal and lots of those familiar guitar fills that Clapton does better than anyone, but which have been done to death. The other original is “Every Little Thing,” which may have already wrapped up the award for worst track of 2013. Not only is it another of the faux-reggae lot, complete with a faux-Marley title, but its chorus halfway in assaults the listener with the worst sound that can be captured by a recording engineer: a children’s chorus. After this debacle, I’d be surprised if we ever got a good new track out of Clapton again.

However, the constant stream of great work from Richard Thompson continues. Electric was recorded in Nashville with Buddy Miller producing, with Thompson including, for the most part, just Taras Prodaniuk on bass, Michael Jerome on drums, and, occasionally, Siobhan Maher Kennedy on backing vocal. Without anything to hide behind, Thompson’s strengths as a singer, songwriter, and guitarist—both electric and acoustic—continue to amaze.

“Stony Ground,” “Sally B,” and especially “Stuck on the Treadmill” have the thump and heft of the sort of rock songs that aren’t getting made much these days: a cranky guy belting out pointed lyrics and driving the point home with guitar solos that sound like the gleam on a shiny new barbed-wire fence you glimpse as you’re about to hit it face-first after being thrown over the handlebars.

“Salford Sunday” and “Where’s Home?” have the folk tinge that Thompson’s work has had since his days with Fairport Convention, the latter featuring the incomparable Stuart Duncan on fiddle and some of the Buddy Miller sound that one might have expected on the rest of the disc. (I also wanted a Thompson/Miller guitar duel, but I guess Buddy knew better). “Straight and Narrow” is another rocker that Thompson does well—a grungy look at an unattainable, frustrating vamp—but I’ve never cared for the Farfisa organ sound.

Another Nashville luminary—Alison Krauss—lends her translucent voice to “The Snow Goose.” Though it’s only for a couple of slight passages, the two voices together are as as gorgeous as a summer sunset sliding through the clouds.

Thompson has always been able to write about the bitter and the sweet of mature relationships as well as anyone, and “Another Small Thing in Her Favour” and “Saving the Good Stuff for You” are two more that resonate more deeply than anything new I’ve heard lately.

“My Enemy” and “Good Things Happen to Bad People” are aptly situated near the middle of Electric, and they amount to 11 devastating minutes of haunting melody, harrowing guitar work, and a vocal/lyric meditation on self-hatred and contempt for the world that holds everyone to account. The effect is not quite cathartic, leaving the listener to deal with the scab that’s just been scraped off.

Electric is my frontrunner for this year’s best album, and it’s going to take something remarkable to change that.

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“Captains & Cowboys” by Mike Aiken

Mike Aiken
Captains & Cowboys
Northwind Records
4 stars (out of 5)

By Larry Stephens

I don’t care much for today’s “country” music. It’s become a blur of lookalike, soundalike singers doing pop songs – at least that’s my take on it. Give me “classic” country. But Americana and other sounds labeled as “roots music” are closely related, and, like classic country, seem to be genres without a home. That’s where Mike Aiken puts his music, and why we do what we do here at the Lonesome Road Review.

This is Aiken’s sixth album but I confess I didn’t recognize his name or music until I checked his website, then one song popped out: “Jagger & Jones.” Listening to Captains & Cowboys other names began popping into my mind: Waylon, Hank Jr., Toby, Adkins (really, “Honky Tonk Badonkadonk” isn’t the highlight of his career). Aiken’s music is too country to be likely to hit the charts and that’s a shame, because it is great listening.

“Take the Boy Fishin’” has a great hook (pun intended), something my son might say in a few years when my granddaughters start dating. The singer is meeting his girlfriend’s father, a fisherman, for the first time.

What’ya say we go fishin’, just you and me

A whole lot can happen when you’re out at sea

You might calm the deep waters or make the sea roll

Ride back in the captain’s seat or swim back to shore

Alrighty, nothing like a challenge for the girl you love. “Your Memory Wins,” on the other hand is the other end of the trip. “When the whiskey wears off, you’re still gone …” while “Bring Out the Bourbon” is a story about two people, potential lovers or not, sharing their lives over a drink or three.

His songs are about life, whether a lament about how we are selling the Appalachians to the Chinese “one coal train at a time” (“Coal Train”) or the hunt for and destruction of our world’s whale populations, built on the lilting sounds of an old-country fiddle tune intro (“Save The Whales”).

Aiken’s a good singer, whether it’s a sensitive lament like “Whales” or trying to explain the inexplicable, why someone would give up love and a comfortable life to be a cowboy (“Night Rider’s Lament”). He’s backed by borrowed musicians who know their craft, including Michael Webb (Poco) and Tammy Rogers (fiddle and mandolin; SteelDrivers).

He ends the albums with a description of his life. In “Captains & Cowboys” he’ll “save the babies and kiss the ladies,” while living life his way. Aiken has lived on a sailboat for twenty years and sailed the seas. He’s also raised horses and been a farrier. That’s a person who is hard to pin down and his music reflects that.

If you like country music that tells stories of life and isn’t just a riff and a soundbite, you need to have some Aiken in your life.

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“Work Hard, Play Hard, Pray Hard: Hard Time, Good Time & End Time Music: 1923-1936″ by Various Artists

Various Artists
Work Hard, Play Hard, Pray Hard: Hard Time, Good Time & End Time Music: 1923-1936
Tompkins Square Records
5 stars (out of 5)

By Aaron Keith Harris

The story behind Work Hard is as wonderfully odd as the music this three-disc set contains. Some guys were cleaning out the house of a recently dead hoarder—Don Wahle of Louisville, Kentucky—and they knew enough to know that the boxes and boxes of 78 RPM records might be of interest to someone.

The Tompkins Square label culled much of its 42-track survey of hilbilly records from 1923 to 1936—including 19 cuts previously unissued in any format but 78—from Wahle’s collection, and the result is captivating.

I’ve always loved recordings from this era, because you can hear the performers (and those running the primitive recording equipment) trying to figure out exactly what it is they are doing. They’re not playing a barn dance with whiskey and dancing, they’re not playing in a church at the back of a holler, and they’re not playing in their parlor with family and friends gathered close. Most of them have never owned a record player. The closest they could have come to mass entertainment was a big fiddle contest, or the various radio shows that were beginning to fill the air and help songs and styles to spread quickly.

But one imagines the musicians recorded here shifting their feet, asking where they should stand and look, and holding back a little, not quite able to cut loose as in their native element. The picking is a little tentative at times too, but the effect is deeply satisfying. The rules of American popular music—country, pop, gospel, and even bluegrass, blues, and jazz—have long been codified 80 or 90 years after these sides were cut, and when we hear Earl McCoy’s staccato steel guitar on “John Henry the Steel Drivin’ Man” with that one unexpected note in his riff, Jimmie Tarlton and Tom Darby’s quavering, yodeling harmonies on “All Bound Down in Texas,” or the Happy Four’s shape-note arrangement with harmonica fills on “Climbing the Golden Stairs,” we can’t help but touch parts of our musical and cultural imagination stored way in the back of our amygdala.

The Work Hard songs on Disc One deal with imagery far removed from most of us—Fiddlin John Carson’s “The Farmer is the Man Who Feeds Them All,” Oscar Ford’s “The Farmer’s Dream,” Red Gay & Jack Wellman’s “Flat Wheel Train Blues, Pts. 1 & 2,” Pierre La Dieu’s “Driving Saw Logs on the Plover”—while talking about ideas we still confront: class division in “Poor Man, Rich Man (Cotton Mill Colic No. 2)” by David McCarn, consumer cynicism in “I’ve Got the Chain Store Blues” by the Allen Brothers, and the injustice of prohibition (alcohol then, certain drugs now) in “When the Roses Bloom Again for the Bootlegger” by Earl Johnson.

The Pray Hard cuts on Disc Three often address issues that came up when country boys went to the city, or city culture came to the country. The listener may not be entirely convinced to go dry by Gid Tanner’s “You’ve Got to Stop Drinking Shine,” but the scolding of the Georgia Yellow Hammers on “I’m S-A-V-E-D” will surely get him to takea firm position one way or the other. “The Gambler’s Dying Words” from Sid Harkreader & Grady Moore sports a melody quite similar to “Roving Gambler” to draw listeners close to hear their warining, reminding me of the chart my church youth pastor put up that pointed the impressionable to soundalike versions of dangerously secular bands.

The Kentucky Holiness Singers live up to their name with “I’m On My Way,” a tune with a proto-bluegrass mandolin break punctuated by a little shouting, and the Dixon Brothers turn in a lovely, pious performance on “Easter Day.”

The most fun here is of course on the 14 Play Hard tracks of Disc Two. Gid Tanner’s “Work Don’t Bother Me” captures the relish that those who worked so hard must have took to the weekend opportunity to tie one on and forget everything for a couple of days. The unnamed members of the improbably named North Carolina Hawaiians turn in a nifty “Solider’s Joy,” the dance number picked on ukulele, guitar, and steel guitar (picked Hawaiian style with some slides reaching into Duane Allman bird-chirping territory), the Carolina Ramblers rave their way through “Barnyard Frolic,” and the Hack String Band’s “Too Tight Rag” is the soundtrack to a cartoon short that hasn’t been made yet, with fiddle, mandolin, tenor banjo, and jazzhorn taking turns on lead licks.

I hadn’t heard of several of the acts on this set before, much less most of the songs, and this set can be enjoyed equally by old-time aficionados and new initiates into these strange and old sounds: you’ll get some of the more typical sounds from this style and era in songs you haven’t heard to death, and some real gems, patterns of sound you’ve never imagined, like the Taylor-Griggs Louisiana Melody Makers’ “When the Moon Drips into the Blood,” and Whit Gaydon’s “Tennessee Coon Hunt.”

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“1945″ by Brad Mackeson

Brad Mackeson

1945

BradMackeson.com

4 stars (out of 5)

By Donald Teplyske

By the time one arrives at track three of Brad Mackeson’s second album, a substantial journey has already occurred.

“They say love is for gamblers and broken hearted fools,” is the phrase that Mackeson has crafted to open this stunning sliver of perfection entitled “Love Is For Gamblers,” but it isn’t the only memorable statement that goes into this impressively written reflection—”My scenery may change, but I will never forget your name” and “Freely I give my love, you owe me no debt”—each verse contains additional poetic affirmation of his lover’s perfection.

Like the finest songs from Bruce Hornsby, Mackeson’s are full-bodied testimonials, gently revealed.

At 23 years, the Nashville-based songwriter from Portland, Oregon creates songs that he has no business being able to even relate to; his is an expansive view of his surroundings, with infatuation and obsession walking hand-in-hand with love and emotional devastation.

His voice, his phrasing is his own, although one can’t help but hear echoes of Dylan, Springsteen, and Petty within a spare couplet, a harmonica fill, or an extended syllable. “Thousand Drums” could be mistaken for a mind-expanding Mumford & Sons track, catchy and pristine. Thoroughly modern with roots that run through my middle-aged experiences, side one of this collection provides one of the most satisfying listens I’ve experienced in quite some time.

It is bold and complex, fuzzy and ripped with poignancy.

Flip to side two and things are entirely different, and no less acutely satisfying. The rest of the world drops away a bit here, and Mackeson appears more isolated and the music speaks to this altered reality.

“I’m too afraid to check my own reflection…what if I’m not who I want to be?” Mackeson challenges within “Gonna Be Fine;” like George Harrison and Harry Nilsson did for a previous generation—and I don’t know why they popped to mind, but they seem apt—Mackeson frequently creates complexity from simplicity. Side two is more free-wheeling than the first side, with added vocal effects that remind one of psychedelic-influenced performances heard on long ago, late-night radio. None of which interferes with the connection Mackeson has established with his audience.

Danny Schmidt. Joe Pug. Mark Erelli. Lee Harvey Osmond. John K. Sampson. Leeroy Stagger.

If those names are on your iPod, you had best add Brad Mackeson.

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“God Didn’t Choose Sides: Civil War True Stories about Real People, Volume 1″ by Various Artists

God Didn’t Choose Sides: Civil War True Stories about Real People, Volume 1
Various Artists
Rural Rhythm Records
4½ stars (out of 5)

By Aaron Keith Harris

The Civil War, or, as it’s more properly called, the War Between the States, has been the subject of several great bluegrass songs—”Legend of the Rebel Solider” by the Country Gentlemen, “Last Day at Gettysburg” by Larry Sparks, and “He Walked All the Way Home” by Blue Highway” come to mind—and this 13-track, 45-minute effort from Rural Rhythm Records adds to the list in a refreshing way.

On God Didn’t Choose Sides, executive producer Sam Passamano II employs a strong lineup of singers, musicians, and songwriters to create a dozen original songs (the album-closing hymn “There is a Fountain,” which gets a gentle, yet majestic reading from the Gap Creek Quartet, is the exception) about actual people who played a part, willingly or not, in a truly horrific war.

Paula Breedlove, Mark Brinkman, and Mike Evans, working in different combinations, share most of the writing credits, with Brad Davis, Ray Edwards, Terry Foust, Steve Gulley, and Tim Stafford also pitching in.

The product is some fine original tunes that offer neither the shallow cant that lionizes the politically motivated Lincoln and the butchers he employed as generals, nor romantic notions of the South, which was controlled by slaveholding oligarchs—the one percenters of the South, if you will—who allowed their blessed homeland to be attacked because they put their private interests ahead of it.

One of the best vocals on the disc, unsurprisingly, comes from Dale Ann Bradley on “Christmas in Savannah,” a tale of a group of Union soldiers from “General Sherman’s line” who brought yuletide provisions with mules dressed as reindeer to the residents of the besieged town. It’s a nice story that shows that even in the worst circumstances people find ways to be kind, but there’s no mention of the fact that Savannah was the lone city that General Sherman, one of America’s most shameful war criminals, didn’t put to the torch on his sadistic march across a defenseless south at the behest of Lincoln and Grant.

I know pointing out things like that aren’t the point of this project, but a little true contrast now and then between the actions of politicians and generals on one hand and ordinary folk on the other can only enhance the esteem we have for the latter.

There are a couple of songs that do that to some degree by pointing out the inhumane treatment of prisoners on both sides—the brooding “Providence Spring” from Tim Stafford and the deceptively soothing ghost story “The Lady in Gray” from Ronnie Bowman.

There are also stories of individuals doing the best to act bravely and honorably in situations where such actions seldom come to a good end: “I’m Almost Home” from Steve Gulley whose delivery embodies the snuffed-out joy of a soldier who leads one last charge only to die on the front steps of the home he had left to go fighting, Russell Moore bringing his sentimental tenor to “A Picture of Three Children” clutched in the hand of a dead solider, the Lonesome River Band performing “The Legend of Jennie Wade” in which three friends try to communicate over hundreds of miles to no avail, and Bradley Walker’s voice singing of one man’s “Last Day at Vicksburg” with stentorian richness.

We meet some other great characters too: the feisty “Old John Burns” from Ricky Wasson & Dwight McCall who turn in one of the ‘grassier cuts included here, Carrie Hassler’s melancholy “Carrie’s Graveyard Book” about a woman who honored the dead to an extent far beyond anyone could have asked her to do, and Dave Adkins’ soulful story of “The River Man” who risked his life repeatedly to help slaves cross the Ohio River.

My favorite track from this fine collection is “Rebel Hart,” from Brad Gulley, son of Steve Gulley and lead singer for Cumberland River. The upbeat track about a 16-year-old Virginia girl who used her feminine wiles and incredible courage to inflict improbable injury after injury on those who had invaded her country cries out for a movie version.

Before “There is a Fountain” closes things out, elder statesman Marty Raybon offers the title track with his characteristic humility, reminding us that the God of the Bible who was worshiped by those victimized could never  have ordained an unnecessary war fought for political reasons that killed as many as 750,000 people. One wishes that a nation that had survived such an ordeal would have learned its most obvious lesson.

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“The Farthest Horizon” by the Sleepy Man Banjo Boys

Sleepy Man Banjo Boys
The Farthest Horizon
www.SleepyManBanjo.com
2 stars (out of 5)

By Donald Teplyske

Straight up—I don’t get it.

Unless I’ve had a relationship with them—family members and friends, students I’ve taught—I’ve never been into hearing kids play music for my own aesthetic enjoyment. I’ve often stated that I don’t believe anyone should record before their 18th birthday.
I’ve felt that way about every 12-year old country singer I’ve seen in too short shorts and too much makeup on a county fair stage. I’m reminded of it each time I witness a teenager performing a ‘tweener at a folk festival. Hell, I felt that way about Chris Thile and Nickel Creek, as good as they were, and the Abrams Brothers did nothing to dissuade me of this unpopular opinion.  I’ve been justified in holding this narrow-minded attitude a hundred times, not the least of which was when I finally saw and heard Cherryholmes live.

I know it isn’t logical, and I realize it is patently unfair and close-minded. And I understand that I’ve likely missed some good music because of my staunch, codgerly ‘rule.’

When the Sleepy Man Banjo Boys—New Jersey brothers Jonny (10), Robbie (13) and Tommy Mizzone (14)—started making the rounds a year or so ago, I completely ignored them.

I didn’t tune in to see them on Letterman. I didn’t go searching for them on YouTube. Again, I didn’t care. When the phenomenon didn’t fade away like farmers doing “Gangnam Style” parodies, and I was assigned this album, I did at least look at some of the clips and did a little reading. Who am I to argue with J.D. Crowe, Andy Leftwich (who plays mandolin throughout this album), Mountain Heart, and Pete Wernick?

I still don’t get it.

I accept that they are kids, and their hearts are in the right place. I trust that the parents are not living their dreams vicariously through offspring, and that the boys are doing this because they want to. And I understand the novelty.

I’ve listened to The Farthest Horizon likely a dozen times. The tunes make pleasant background music. But I hear nothing—including Leftwich’s mando contributions, because they don’t stand out—that I couldn’t hear at any decent bluegrass jam or local festival. It isn’t bad, not by any means. The instrumentals sound fine. The music sounds good, and I suppose that should be ‘good enough.’

What I don’t hear is ‘life.’ The instances where Ashley Lilly, granddaughter of bluegrass pioneer Everett Lilly, sings are interesting from that perspective, but underwhelming except to give my ‘rule’ additional merit. I can’t argue that the trio of brothers from New Jersey doesn’t have musical talent, because they obviously do. Guitarist Tommy Mizzone seems to have a style I might enjoy in the future.

I’ve certainly heard more skilled versions of “Gold Rush” and “Shuckin’ the Corn.” Their original instrumentals don’t stand out; only a single one has stayed with me longer than the time it took to play. “The Man from Danville,” obviously inspired by the playing of Tony Rice, is memorable, but not necessarily remarkable. The lyrics to “Always the One” read like they were discovered scribbled onto a middle-schooler’s notebook.

At the outset, I admitted that I don’t get it. But if you don’t hold child musicians to the same standard as adult professionals and can enjoy them on that level, you will find something good here.

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“Bluegrass Bluesman: A Memoir” by Josh Graves, edited by Fred Bartenstein

Bluegrass Bluesman: A Memoir
Josh Graves (Edited by Fred Bartenstein)
University of Illinois Press
5 stars (out of 5)

By Aaron Keith Harris

If you made a Mt. Rushmore for bluegrass music instrumentalists, there would have to be six faces—not five as Bill Monroe originally intended—and that sixth face would have to be the smiling visage of Josh Graves. Burkett Howard Graves, known professionally as “Buck” or “Uncle Josh,” was born in Tellico Plains, Tennessee (Monroe County, oddly enough) in 1927 and popularized the use of the Dobro, or resonator guitar, in bluegrass music.

Others, including yodeler Cliff Carlisle and his Hawaiian steel guitar and Bashful Brother Oswald, who played Dobro with Roy Acuff, had made the slide guitar sound part of country music, but when Monroe’s new brand of music called bluegrass branched off just after World War II, the Kentucky bandleader brought with him only guitar, upright bass, fiddle, and his own rapid-fire mandolin. Joined with Earl Scruggs three-finger banjo style, the new style became a separate and distinct form of country music.

In a series of recorded interviews that Fred Bartenstein has shaped into Bluegrass Bluesman: A Memoir, Josh Graves tells us how his Dobro playing was able to cut in and become a partner in what quickly became a highly stylized dance. First with Mac Wiseman and, starting in 1955 with Lester Flatt & Earl Scruggs’ Foggy Mountain Boys, Graves’ tone-rich, loud Dobro sound—the right hand influenced by Scruggs’ picking style, the left hand by Lightnin’ Hopkins and other black blues players—cut through the other noise to become an accepted part of a music played by hard-headed men whose main innovation was to tweak and then codify tradition.

At 176 pages (including a foreword from Neil Rosenberg, an introduction from Fred Bartenstein, and 16 pages containing 41 great black and white photographs) Bluegrass Bluesman is a slim volume, but that’s one of its virtues. The effect is that of spending a a day on the bus with a genial host who has lots of great stories not only about himself, but of many of the founders of one of America’s unique contributions to world music. Some of portraits are less-then-flattering, but there’s nothing vindictive or gratuitous, just the confirmation that our musical heroes are people too, and that their foibles and faults sometimes had important effects on the music just as their incredible talents did.

About 20 pages are dedicated to short tributes and remembrances from well-known colleagues, friends, and acolytes, and there’s a short appendix from Bobby Wolfe about Graves’ best-known guitars that will be of great interest to many.
Bluegrass Bluesman belongs with Can’t You Hear Me Callin’: The Life of Bill Monroe, Traveling the High Way Home: Ralph Stanley and the World of Traditional Bluegrass Music, and Still Inside: The Tony Rice Story as essential portraits of musicians essential to the history of bluegrass music.

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“The Colored Pencil Factory” by Astrograss and “Blue Couds” by Elizabeth Mitchell & You Are My Flower

Astrograss
The Colored Pencil Factory
Foggy Borough Records
4 stars (out of 5)

Elizabeth Mitchell & You Are My Flower
Blue Clouds
Smithsonian Folkways Recordings
5 stars (out of 5)

By Aaron Keith Harris

I was made an uncle almost four years ago, and since then I have started thinking about music for children for the first time. The first question to ask is whether there should be any difference in music children listen to. I guess there has been literature and music for children as long as adults have had the disposable income and free time to make it—and it would make sense that some subject matter isn’t appropriate for certain ages—but should music for children sound any different? Do silly voices and jumpy tempos appeal to children more? Why do they make versions of already juvenile pop music sung by insipid choirs of children?

I would suspect that most of the worst music for children is simply marketed toward their parents with no thought to the children themselves, but, happily, two recent examples of good music made especially for children have reached me recently.

The first is from Brooklyn-based Astrograss, who bill themselves as “NYC’s premier bluegrass band for all ages.” The Colored Pencil Factory looks to be their third recording for children, and its 16 tracks and 49 minutes are a fun listen even for a curmudgeonly bachelor. Their musicianship is truly first rate, with Dennis Lichtman’s mandolin kickoff to “Hey Blue Dog” worthy of Monroe himself, Jonah Bruno’s banjo on “Playground” influenced by Monroe sideman Rudy Lyle’s famous “White House Blues,” and standards like “Sawing on the Strings,” “Shortenin’ Bread,” “Cluck Old Hen,” and “Sail Away Ladies” presented with great fiddling by Sarah Alden with pretty much the same attitude one would find on any old bluegrass or old-time record.

Alden trades vocal duties with Jordan Shapiro and Tim Kiah, one of whom has a voice that favorably compares to Darrell Scott’s, though from the liner notes I can’t tell which. Though they’re aiming for happy enthusiasm rather than subtle blends, their harmonies are usually quite good, and the lyrics on the original tunes assume far more intelligence on the part of children than most other stuff I’ve heard.

Elizabeth Mitchell’s Blue Clouds is just a bit better and is as good as I can imagine a children’s album getting. Mitchell and husband Daniel Littleton are part of the indie band Ida, and with daughter Storey, who looks to be about 12 now, mom and dad form the band You Are My Flower, who have now released seven albums for children.

Blue Clouds is gentle, quiet, and melodic, with Jay Ungar and Molly Mason contributing their talents, and Storey and a handful of other children singing backup. None of the vocals from adults or children here are hokey, with the effect that children who listen are drawn into a sound that has a deeper meaning than just having fun or getting silly.

Indeed, Bill Withers’ “I Wish You Well” is a song that will deeply touch both parents and children. Other musical giants are adapted here: David Bowie’s “Kooks” speaks to the virtues of being different, Jimi Hendrix’s tender “May this Be Love” is a showcase for Littleton’s gorgeous guitar playing, the Allman Brothers’ “Blue Sky” (with a “Little Martha” intro) is an acoustic version as beautiful as the electric original, and Van Morrison’s “Everyone” may be the best cover ever done of one of the grumpy Ulsterman’s  songs, with flute and children’s harmonies filling out the playfulness of the original.

Throw in some originals, a couple of American folk songs (“Hop Up, My Ladies” and “Froggie Went a-Courtin’”), songs from Korea (“San Toki (Mountain Bunny)”) and Japan (“Yuki (Snow)”), and the 13th-century English tune “Summer is Icumen In,” and you’ve got an incredibly well-laden pallet of music that this curmudgeonly bachelor has listened to a few times for no other reason than it’s a great record.

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“Go Parker!” by Jeff Parker

Jeff Parker
Go Parker!
Lonesome Day Records
4 stars (out of 5)

By Larry Stephens

Jeff Parker has been immersed in bluegrass music since 1967, including stints with the Renfro Valley Barn Dance. He was a member of the Lonesome River Band (2001 – 2007) then joined Dailey & Vincent in 2007. This is his second solo album, following Two Roads to Travel from 2004.

Given his history in bluegrass, it’s not surprising that his latest CD has a traditional sound, albeit the inclusion of the dreaded piano and drums. He invited a host of friends to appear on the CD, including Jamie Dailey (harmony vocals) and Darrin Vincent (harmony vocals and bass), Mike Bub (bass), Ron Stewart (fiddle, banjo and guitar), Cia Cherryholmes (vocals and banjo), Ned Luberecki (banjo) and Matt Despain (Dobro), plus others. The quality of the music is unsurprisingly outstanding.

He steps off into acoustic country with “Hello Darlin’.” No one will ever top Conway Twitty’s growl (although Shawn Baldridge [Goldwing Express] comes close) but Parker does just fine with it, backed by Josh Shilling’s (Mountain Heart) piano and Shawn Brock’s drums. There are not many bluegrass fans who don’t also enjoy classic country music, and this is a good one.

“Plant Some Flowers By My Graveside” was part of Bill Monroe’s repertoire and Parker (with Dailey & Vincent) gives a touching rendition. Another from the same era (also co-written by Jimmie Davis, with Dailey & Vincent joining on the track) is “Let’s Be Sweethearts Again.” If you’ve been around bluegrass any time at all you’ve heard someone sing this song. This arrangement tests Parker’s vocal range but he hits the high notes without a quaver or flat tone. (And, of course, Jamie Dailey can hit notes higher than cirrus clouds.)

You won’t hear many songs in bluegrass that were also recorded by Duke Ellington and contemporaries like Cab Calloway, but from 1924 comes “How Come You Do Me Like You Do,” proving that it’s not necessarily a song’s pedigree that makes it bluegrass, it’s how the artists performs it. Parker and crew rip through it and most listeners would never guess that it is a jazz standard. This isn’t the only song with hot licks. “Lord I Hate To See My Darling Go” scoots along at breakneck speed.

Reaching back again, Parker (with Cia Cherryholmes) gives us an old Louvin Brothers’ song, “When I Loved You.” “Sweet Mary” is a beautiful song about losing love, kicked off by Matt Despain’s Dobro while “Cold Rails” has more of a country sound.

This is a CD filled with good music and artists at the top of their game, centered around Parker who, because of his duties as a harmony singer with LRB and D&V, may often be underrated as a lead singer. Let’s hope he doesn’t wait another nine years for his next solo project.