Tag Archives: Folk

Peter Case: Peter Case

petercase_petercaseA soulful rock ‘n’ roller creates a modern folk sound on bonus-laden 2016 reissue

Two years after the breakup of the Plimsouls, Peter Case returned with a solo album that departed from soul-tinged rock ‘n’ roll and moved to folk and blues rendered in modern hues. T-Bone Burnett’s production includes electric guitars and drums, but they’re layered carefully among acoustic and synthetic elements. Case’s new material sported more abstract surfaces and tackled introspective and socially conscious themes, and combined with Burnett’s production, led the singer to more subtle vocals. A few of the songs, including “Walk in the Woods” and the Pogues’ “Pair of Brown Eyes,” are narrative, but others, including “Echo Wars,” “Steel Strings” and “I Shook His Hand” remain more open ended.

Case’s is matched by Burnett and the assembled musicians, as harmonica and percussive guitar are backed by a Van Dyke Parks string arrangement on “Small Town Spree,” and Jerry Marotta’s drum machine adds texture on several tracks. Omnivore’s 2016 reissue includes a sixteen-page booklet with new liner notes by Case, and expands the original twelve-track lineup with seven bonuses. The latter features acoustic versions of “Steel Strings” and “I Shook His Hand” previously issued on the promo-only Selections from Peter Case, and five vault finds. Latter day fans who haven’t dug back this far in Case’s catalog now have a reason to do so, and fans have a good reason to upgrade. [©2016 Hyperbolium]

Peter Case’s Home Page

Various Artist: Highway Prayer – A Tribute to Adam Carroll

various_highwayprayeratributetoadamcarrollSome of Americana’s finest songwriters salute a peer

It’s one thing for a songwriter to be fêted with a tribute album at the relatively young at of 42, but to be honored by a who’s who of one’s peers speaks louder than words. And with the likes of James McMurtry, Hayes Carll and Slaid Cleaves having satchels full of terrific original material, their willingness to saddle up a favorite from Adam Carroll’s catalog is both a tributary offering and an artistic opportunity. The largely acoustic productions of Jenni Finlay and Brian T. Atkinson rightly leave the limelight on lyrics whose emotional resonance is immediate, and whose meters are so natural that they barely sound composed.

Each performer finds a natural fit to their chosen song, with the Band of Heathens’ digging a gospel groove for “Oklahoma Gypsy Shuffler” and Matt the Electrician adding anxious fingerpicking to “Old Town Rock ‘n’ Roll.” There’s two-stepping mandolin and steel as Noel McKay and Brennen Leigh sing the story of Bob, the “Karaoke Cowboy,” and Walt Wilkins explores a showman’s life in “Highway Prayer.” Carroll’s lyrics derive from fleeting moments, snapshots whose studied details conjure life stories. His narratives drop their baggage on the platform to chase expectation down the tracks, one step ahead of consequence.

Carroll slips easily between observed detail and poetic flight, framing everyday images as literary moments. He’s particularly adept at portraiture, whether it’s a colorful hustler, a rural taxi driver or a karaoke singer, he sees what you might feel, but couldn’t verbalize, capturing a person’s essence in the details of their physical being and actions. The titles draw heavily from Carroll’s first two albums, South of Town and Lookin’ Out the Screen Door, as well as 2008’s Old Town Rock ‘n’ Roll, and Carroll himself appears at CD’s end to honor “My Only Good Shirt.” It’s a sweet way to close this tribute to a much loved songwriter. [©2016 Hyperbolium]

Adam Carroll’s Home Page

Michael Fracasso: Here Come the Savages

MichaelFracasso_HereComeTheSavagesPowerful album of 60s-tinged singer-songwriter melancholy

Austin singer-songwriter Michael Fracasso has certainly earned his Americana stripes, but his latest release connects to a time when singer-songwriters were emerging from multiple musical vantage points. His albums have threaded together, folk, pop, rock, blues and country, and his songwriting craft has shown the years spent sharing New York City stages with Steve Forbert and others. His new album mixes original material with cover songs, and though the latter include interesting choices and performances (highlighted by a droning psychedelic ending to the Young Rascals’ “How Can I Be Sure” and a crawling take of Willie Cobbs’ “You Don’t Love Me” that surely holds live audiences in thrall), it’s the original material that shines most brightly.

Fracasso conjures the sing-song melancholy of Harry Nilsson on “Say,” “Open” and “Daisy,” and transforms an unexpected reaction into the title track’s moody meditation. Wounds are pondered, forgiven, healed, and in the case of the “Boy in a Bubble,” broken hearts are glimpsed as an escape from emotional numbness. The latter’s orchestration evokes Curt Boettcher, Burt Bacharach and the Left Banke, and on “Little Scar,” you can hear the influence of Emitt Rhodes. Fracasso’s tenor is arresting, with slight hitches here and there, in case the purity of his tone doesn’t get you first. The album closes with the Kinks’ bittersweet “Better Things,” bookending Fracasso’s album-opening look forward at divorce, and edging the album painfully towards redemption. [©2016 Hyperbolium]

Michael Fracasso’s Home Page

Josh White: Josh at Midnight

JoshWhite_JoshAtMidnightJosh White’s 1956 folk-blues classic returns to vinyl in grand fashion

By the time Josh White began recording for Elektra in 1955, he’d reached heights that few other African-American entertainers had attained. He’d become a recording, concert and radio star, a civil rights activist and confident of FDR, and appeared in mainstream and avant garde films. But he’d also run afoul of both the left and the right by voluntarily testifying in front of the HUAC, ending up blacklisted (officially by the right, unofficially by the left) and unable to make a living in the US. But Jac Holzman bucked both sides of the political spectrum and offered White an opportunity to record for his fledgling Elektra label, releasing The Story of John Henry… A Musical Narrative as a double 10-inch album and 12-inch LP.

The following year saw the release of Josh at Midnight, an album that helped restore White’s career and boosted Elektra’s commercial fortunes. Recorded in mono with a single mic (a classic Telefunken U-47), the sound is spontaneous, lively and crisp. White is backed by bassist Al Hall and baritone vocalist Sam Gary as he works through material drawn largely from the public domain. Many of these songs were, or became, favorites of the folk revival, but even the most well-known are fresh in White’s hands. The material ranges from the sacred (“Jesus Gonna Make Up My Dyin’ Bed” “Joshua Fit the Battle of Jericho”) to the profane (“St. James Infirmary” “Jelly Jelly!”), with several humorous stops in between.

Ramseur’s reissue was supervised by Jac Holzman, prepared by Bruce Botnick and mastered by Bernie Grundman. The front cover reproduces the original, but with Ramseur’s logo slotted in place of Elektra’s. The back cover includes new liner notes by Holzman and song notes by Kenneth S. Goldstein, and the record labels mimic the look and color of Elektra’s. It’s a shame this vinyl-only release leaves those in the digital world with inferior MP3s, or a CD or two-fer of unknown provenance, but LP, MP3 or CD, this is an absolute classic, and a must-have for anyone whose original (or thrift-store) copy has been worn out from repeated play. [©2016 Hyperbolium]

Ramseur Records’ Home Page

Various Artists: On Top of Old Smoky – New Old-Time Smoky Mountain Music

Various_OnTopOfOldSmokyReviving the music of 1930s Appalachia

In the late 1930s, as those living on the land that became the Great Smoky Mountains National Park were leaving (some voluntarily, some forcibly) their homesteads, farms, mines and logging camps, folklorist Joseph Hall collected field recordings of their dialectical speech and music. Selections from those aluminum platters and acetate discs were first released by the Great Smoky Mountains Association on 2010’s Old-Time Smoky Mountain Music [1 2]. Six years later, the GSMA has commissioned contemporary performances of twenty-three traditional Appalachian songs and popular material that had made its way into the mountains via commercial recordings.

The new recordings use of fiddle, guitar and banjo lends the performances the sort of informal backporch feel that Hall captured with his original field work. Ted Olson’s liner notes provide a brief history of the national park’s foundation, detail on Hall’s research, brief song notes and lyric transcriptions. The material includes fiddle tunes, ballads, blues, children’s songs, rags, harmony duets, yodels, westerns and sacred songs. The range of music that was created in the isolated hollars of the Smokies is truly impressive, and these new performances add links to the folk music chain. Dolly Parton and Norman Blake are the name artists, but the entire cast does this music proud. [©2016 Hyperbolium]

Great Smoky Mountain Association’s Home Page

Shane Alexander: Bliss

ShaneAlexander_BlissCalifornia singer-songwriter spans acoustic folk and canyon pop

After five solo albums, and earlier records recorded with Young Art, Damone and the Greater Good, singer-songwriter Shane Alexander has self-produced his most sonically fetching work yet. The sparseness of 2013’s Ladera can still be heard in the opener, with Paul Simon-styled finger-picking and a double-tracked vocal that suggests Elliot Smith. But the album quickly expands beyond acoustic folk with the second cut’s driving drums and atmospheric piano and steel, echoing 1970s canyon rock with a melancholy lyric of haunted memories and a memorable chorus hook. And melancholy turns into panic as a relationship dies in the power ballad “Hold Me Helpless.”

Alexander can be abstract as he introspects his history and surroundings. “I Will Die Alone” is lined by moments in time, but they’re connected weigh-points rather than a linear narrative, and the allusional “Nobody Home” has the rhythm of pursuit for its fractional imagery. Alexander’s bliss may be in the act of observation rather than the observations themselves, but he shines a lovelight on “Heart of California,” pledging his undying gratitude for the state’s inspirational bounty. His greatest bliss, however, was likely the chance to record in his own studio, allowing his songs to unfold without a meter running. For those who haven’t met Shane Alexander, this is a great introduction. [©2016 Hyperbolium]

Shane Alexander’s Home Page

Mark Erelli: For a Song

MarkErelli_ForASongNortheast singer-songwriter returns with a strong set of originals

It’s been six years since Mark Erelli released a new set of original material. In that time he’s played with Lori McKenna, Josh Ritter and Paula Cole (the latter of whom appears on two tracks here), recorded two albums with Barnstar, and released Milltowns in tribute to Bill Morrissey. Rather than taking on a coat of solo songwriter rust, Erelli’s pen has been refilled by the hiatus. His singing voice is still reminiscent of Paul Simon, but these gentle electric productions show the time off was spent sharpening his already sharp songcraft.

The album opens solemnly with a northerner’s loneliness amid the midwest’s wide-open spaces, contemplates the day’s emotional harvest and the next day’s challenges, and mulls over the existential questions that lay in the twilight. He venerates the extraordinary of the everyday in the know-how of a fixit man (“Analog Hero”), a contemplative janitor (“Look Up”) and a Dutch busker (“Netherlands”). The details of his descriptions are extraordinary, and the galloping lyric of “Wayside” demonstrates his talent for shaping words into music.

His facility is equally well spent in poetic observations of a river’s destiny (“French King”) as it is in a meditation on aging (“Magic”) or love song (“Hourglass”). And his voice fits as easily into acoustic guitar laments as full-band arrangements. He’s accumulated numerous songwriting awards over the years, but as the title of his latest album attests, his greatest reward is in writing and performing songs. This collection he takes his already estimable talents to an extraordinary new level. [©2016 Hyperbolium]

Mark Erelli’s Home Page

Tommy Womack: Namaste

TommyWomack_NamasteA songwriter finds his center

Brushing up against death will make you philosophical. Or at least that’s the impact it’s had on songwriter Tommy Womack, whose 2012 recovery from near-fatal addiction and 2015 recovery from a life-threatening car accident has deepened his introspection, magnified his gratitude and optimism, and sharpened his sense of humor. All are on full display in this new collection of songs, essaying everything from wry takes on aging to blunt confrontations of faith and death.

The album opens with hope and wit in “Angel” and “Comb-Over Blues,” before turning to a Lou Reed-styled monotone for “End of the Line.” The latter reflects on the heightened awareness of mortality brought by recovery’s second chance, and segues seamlessly into the Dylan-ish “It’s Been All Over Before.” That second chance is met head on in “I Almost Died,” a harrowing first-person account of a drug-fueled near-death in which Womack recreates an addict’s obstinate dependence on “almost.”

Now in his fifties, Womack’s more sanguine about bad times, drawing from them an ability to see his own beliefs in context. He stacks his religious views against Christian history in the twangy country shuffle “God III” and his beat poem “Nashville” is a love letter to a city of contrasts, one in which songs are written by appointment and swapped in informal songwriter nights. He closes with the optimism of “It’s a Beautiful Morning,” a sentiment that’s knowing rather than naive, and a fitting cap to stories of hard-earned lessons. [©2016 Hyperbolium]

Tommy Womack’s Home Page

Robert Rex Waller, Jr.: Fancy Free

RobertRexWallerJr_FancyFreeStellar covers album from I See Hawks in L.A. frontman

After seven albums with I See Hawks in L.A., singer-songwriter Robert Rex Waller, Jr. decided it was time to step out for a solo album. But unlike singer-songwriters who want to work a cache of songs that weren’t right for the band, Waller endeavored to escape his own writing by waxing an album full of cover songs. The album rambles through well known hits and deep album cuts, drawing a picture of Waller’s personal musical tapestry. Among the best known titles are a lovely piano arrangement of the Kinks’ “Waterloo Sunset,” a Casio-based take on the Oak Ridge Boys’ “Fancy Free,” a synth backed version of the Hollies’ “The Air That I Breathe,” and a Waylon-esque vocal on Dylan’s “She Belongs to Me.”

Cover songs are a unique opportunity for an artist to both pay tribute to and fuse with their influences. In the best case, the cover neither replaces nor leads inextricably to the original, but illuminates new dimensions of the song, its writer and its covering artist. And that’s exactly what we get as Waller takes us for a ride through the formation of his musical consciousness and into his present day imagination. He samples from the songbooks of Utah Phillips, Neil Young, Daniel Johnston and Mike Stinson, filling out a mythical jukebox that would keep you at the bar for a few more rounds. This is a deeply personal collection that will resound strongly with Waller’s fans. [©2016 Hyperbolium]

Robert Rex Waller Jr.’s Home Page

Sammy Walker: Brown Eyed Georgia Darlin’

SammyWalker_BrownEyedGeorgiaDarlinA perfectly preserved echo of the folk revival

Although these demos were recorded in the mid-70s, their guitar, harmonica and socially adept lyrics reach straight back to Dylan and Walker’s early proponent, Phil Ochs. His nasal voice recalls both Dylan and Arlo Guthrie (and for those who enjoyed mid-70s buskers, Jim Page), but his lyrical voice is his own. His lyrics are less strident than Ochs’, more linear than Dylan’s, and less caustic than Paul Simon’s early work. But Walker has the same knack for turning moments into philosophy, and telling stories whose points are larger than the lyric. He selects his words for both meaning and sound, making his guitar accompaniment all that’s needed.

The title track opens the album with poetic images of a hard ride through sun and wind, to the cool reprieve at trail’s end. Walker returns to nature for “If I Had the Time,” dreaming of elsewhere while remaining rooted in the land, and he essays dreams again in the cleverly titled “I Ain’t Got Time to Kill,” marking his realization that one’s time is finite and should be spent with care. The contrasting scenes of “A Cold Pittsburgh Morning” are chillier than the headline, and the hardship of “The East Colorado Dam” is a box canyon. Walker re-recorded many of these songs with a band for his Warner Brothers albums but the fuller arrangements haven’t remained as fresh as these demos. This is a great find for fans. [©2016 Hyperbolium]

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