Muleskinner - Live Original Television Soundtrack

I'm kind of a sucker for "lost bands," like The Flatlanders, and this is a doozy.  Legendary flatpicker Clarence White (of The Byrds fame), singer / songwriter Peter Rowan, mandolin virtuoso David Grisman, accomplished fiddler Richard Greene, and banjo man Bill Keith.  Even at the time, Muleskinner was something of a supergroup; White had been with the Byrds, Rowan, Greene, and Keith were former Bluegrass Boys, and Grisman had played with Red Allen, Del McCoury, and Jerry Garcia. 

The band is frankly inspiring.  White has a reputation as the godfather of acoustic flatpicking, and he shows it off on several of the tracks here, such as "I Am a Pilgrim."  Grisman is the most respected mandolinist alive, and while this is more conventional than some of his "Dawg music," he has no problem with "New Camptown Races" or "Opus in G Minor."  With so many talented pickers, Keith's banjo gets a bit of short shrift, but he still shows off some tasty melodic licks on tunes such as "The Dead March."  Rowan is really impressive here - he's maybe the greatest minor key singer in the bluegrass idiom, and he just nails it on folk tune "Red Rocking Chair" and his own epic, "Land Of the Navajo."  But Richard Greene is the revelation for me here.  Despite his extensive career I'd never heard of him before this project, and now that makes me feel like an idiot.  He's all over this album, and whether playing it straight in a old-time melody line in "The Eighth of January" or really creative, organic use of rhythms and slurs in "Blackberry Blossom" or some of both in blistering closer "Orange Blossom Special," he's incredible.

This album is more of a tease than anything else, showing what might have been if not for Clarence White's tragic death in a car accident.  The Live Original Television Soundtrack shows the skill of each of its members, but just scratches the surface of the inventiveness each would show through long careers.  Could they have been New Grass Revival, ten years earlier?  Could they have been Punch Brothers or The Infamous Stringdusters twenty-five years earlier?  Who knows.  Even if it doesn't show everything the group was capable of, this is still a fine album and a heck of a listen.

Peter Rowan and Tony Rice - Quartet

Rating: B+

It's tough to evaluate a bluegrass album. Many of the normal criteria I use when evaluating albums seem to be moot. Songwriting? Many bluegrass songs are not original tunes but handed down from the Appalachian folk tradition. Instrumental skill? Pretty much any bluegrass recording is going to have it in spades. Strong singing? Ditto. Inventiveness? Here's where it gets tricky. Certainly there are the Infamous Stringdusters and Tim O'Briens of the greater bluegrass world, but what about the artists operating in the realm of "traditional bluegrass?" Is it fair to judge them by the same standards as folks who are trying to push the envelope?

It's not fair to make Peter Rowan and Tony Rice sound like they're just paint-by-numbers guys; far from it. Rowan has spent a career collaborating with genre-breakers like David Grisman and Jerry Garcia and bringing a folk singer-songwriter sensibility to the bluegrass world. That songwriting skill is on display here ... kind of. Nearly half the album was written by Rowan (or, in the case of the now-classic "Walls of Time," co-written with bluegrass founder / giant Bill Monroe), but only album closer "Perfection" is new; the rest are like half a greatest hits package played with a new band. Rice, meanwhile, is arguably the most accomplished flatpicker in the bluegrass idiom. He's brought influence from jazz, folk, and blues to his guitar style and worked with luminaries like Grisman, Garcia, J.D. Crowe, and Alison Krauss. The quartet is rounded out by mandolinist Sharon Gilchrist and bass player Bryn Davies, who also provide backing vocals.

So what do we have here? Well, it's mostly very good. Rice gets to show off his six-string wizardry on traditional tune "Shady Grove" and Rowan's jamgrass classic "Midnight Moonlight." Rowan's seasoned, warbly tenor is terrific on "The Walls of Time" and especially on a really eerie version of "Cold Rain and Snow" - I didn't think this song could be done better than Del McCoury does it, but Rowan's version in my opinion tops even Del's. The harmony singing from Gilchrist and Davies is terrific on Townes Van Zandt tune "To Live Is To Fly" and "Let the Harvest Go To Seed." It's not all highlights; Rowan's singing is overwrought on opener "Dust Bowl Children," "Trespasses" is just slow and meandering, and sole new tune "Perfection" is just OK. And I'll ding them a bit for a lack of adventurousness. All in all, however, this is a strong effort; two giants of the genre who have earned the right to do whatever they want making a fine, solid album that doesn't break any new ground.

Buy it from Amazon:
Quartet
Tony Rice Official Site
Peter Rowan Official Site