TREES/GRASS: DEAD GRASS

(It's extraordinary the things you discover in this job, one being the difference a space between 2 words can make. And the similarity. 'Dead Grass' is the name of an album by the late great fidler extraordinaire Vassar Clements, of whose music I have been a fan since I was 15. 'Deadgrass' is the name of a band who peddle the self same concept as did that album, albeit as a current working live band. And whose bio seems resolutely to avoid any reference to the earlier. Funny that.)

So, 'Dead Grass', then? More or less as it says on the tin, the music of the Grateful Dead through a bluegrass filter. Arguably not as great a leap as it sounds, Garcia's pre-Dead background in jugbands and his lifelong love of and sidetracking into banjo based acoustic hillbilly music being well known. I have racks of this stuff from Old and in the Way, through myriad duet sets with David Grisman, a celebrated mandolin player, also a member of OaitW. Vassar Clements, himself no stranger to Garcia and the band, having played on 'In the Wake of the Flood' and been also a 3rd member of OaitW, was, or certainly looked, much older school than his cohorts, and had an interesting life.

Born in 1928 and self-taught on the fiddle, he soon came to the attention of Bill Monroe, joining his Bluegrass Boys, barely as he turned 20. After a few years live experience he was ready for greater recognition, spending time with many of the bluegrass giants, including playing, alongside Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs on this masterpiece. However, the middle of the 60s saw him fall prey to the bottle, and it seemed it had fully let him down, he scraping by in dead-end jobs.

Newly sober and developing a new name for himself, in sessions, he was fortunate enough to find himself swept up into the commotion of a groundbreaking moment in american music, The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band's 'Will the Circle Be Unbroken', in 1972.

This fabulous collaborative piece of work was the idea of the Dirt Band and their then manager, to team up their no mean talents with those of the generation behind them, putting a bunch of longhaired hippies into the room with a bunch of distrustful short-back-and-sides elder statesmen, like Roy Acuff, Jimmie Martin and the aforementioned Scruggs. Astonishingly it gelled, the recorded between song dialogue reflecting the initial suspicions. Clements featured heavily, arguably, alongside Doc Watson, the blind guitar-picking maestro, coming off the best of an impressive roster. From there, his second wind was off, Grateful Dead sessions, work with an immediately post Allman's Dickey Betts and a solo career.  As mentioned earlier, he joined up with Jerry Garcia, Dave Grisman, bass player John Kahn and another ex-Bluegrass Boy, Peter Rowan, on guitar, to form Old and in the Way. With Garcia on banjo, they had a modus operandi of playing both traditional songs and grassed up covers of contemporary songs. Whilst no Dead songs made it on to any of their records, I would think it strange if they didn't sneak the odd one into their live sets, no doubt fuelling the idea for 'Dead Grass', which appeared in 2000, arguably helped along by the 'Pickin' On' series. For me, 'Dead Grass' has the greater whiff of authenticity, Clements being a tangible link to the band, the songs remaining songs, proper songs with vocals, rather than the slight sterility of meticulously rehearsed instrumentals.

In the intervening years Clements had remained busy, taking forward his concept of Hillbilly Jazz, a freewheeling amalgam of blue grass, western swing, jazz and old-times standards. The similarly entitled 1975 album is a thing of some wonder. Seldom ever can Bob Wills and Benny Goodman have sat alongside each other in the song credits. Very much Clement's project, backing musicians included David Bromberg and longtime Elvis drummer, D.J. Fontana. I remember reading about this record a year or two after 'Will The Circle', never ever seeming to be able to find a copy. I finally remedied that about 15 years ago, about the time Amazon were becoming a player, and from whom you could get anything. A joy better late than never.

There were a few more similar recordings, but the ever itchy fingered Clements kept stretching his boundaries, including a fascinating duet live recording with Stephane Grappelli, their styles seemingly poles apart, the Hot Club de Paris translated to a log cabin in the Appalachians. It shouldn't, but it works, believe me. Towards the end of his life; he died in 2005, he was exploring the blues, his final recording being 'Livin' With the Blues', another belter, alongside the likes of Elvin Bishop, Maria Muldaur and likeminded genre-defining harmonica man, Norton Buffalo.

I love fiddle music and how it can touch any style. If my top three exponents include Sugar Cane Harris and Dave Swarbrick, Clements is surely the king.

Oo, before I forget, final word, Deadgrass.

Hillbilly!

Steps & Stairs: Nitty Gritty Dirt Band - One Step Over the Line

purchase [One Step Over the Line]

<One Step Over the Line> is not to be confused with the better known <One Toke Over the Line> despite the fact that the syllabication and hence - to some extent the application to a musical format -is pretty similar.

The latter by Brewer and Shipley, the former by John Hiatt.

But the choice for the theme is John Hiatt (and Rosanne Cash) performing with the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band.


The Dirt Band first appeared mid 60's doing Mr Bojangles among other pieces. And then they sort of faded into the background until they came back with their <Will the Circle Be Unbroken> albums, the 2nd of which includes this piece.

I read somewhere that the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band was the group that made country music appeal to rock music fans.
That's certainly true for me (although I do like Country music of a certain style with or without the Dirt Band).

This song seems to appear most often with a female backup vocal. Rightly so. John Hiatt has an inimitable style, but his crooning improves with a female side-kick on vocals.

DARKNESS: DARK AS A DUNGEON

Coming to this theme direct from the last, immediately it becomes apparent how darkness holds so much greater imagination for the songwriter than it's blinking faintly opposite, whether as a metaphor for mood or for the, literally, dark side, or end, whether of the moon or the street. Type in black, the colour of darkness, into your search engine and the names of the bands, the songs and the albums come spouting forth. Almost too much choice, so I have decided to go all literal on you. And what could be darker than a coalmine. Unless it's a dungeon.

Merle Travis might be considered the patron singer of coalminers, to the extent I was surprised he had never been one himself. However, born in in Muhlenberg County, Kentucky, prime mining territory, he was always going to be only too aware of it's ravages on those who had no choice but to work underground. I had never heard of him until a moment of epiphany, early 70's, as a schoolboy in England, when a friend lent me the seminal hillbilly mountain music of the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band's "Will the Circle be Unbroken", wherein the Dirt Band came together with a host of worthy names from the bluegrassier side of country over six sides of vinyl. To my Deep Purpled ears, the electricity of much of this acoustic music was astonishing, with my favorite track being this song, an altogether mellower fare, as performed by Travis himself, and including exemplary blind picker, Doc Watson, the two, astonishingly, having never met. (Indeed, the recording includes their introduction and conversation, prior to playing the song, sadly not included here.)

(Buy Merle and the Dirt Band together!)
Written and recorded first in 1946, in a four disc box of 78s, entitled Folk Songs of the Hills, a set which drew on both traditional songs and his own, drawing on experiences of appalachian life. Another song in this set was the perhaps even better known "Sixteen Tons." Each have been covered many times, within and without the country bluegrass idiom, so here are a couple of conventional dungeons.
                                         
                                          

Somewhat of a no-brainer that this song should turn up on Kathy Mattea's 2008 recording, "Coal", and, even if it has been a while since women or children were let loose down at the coalface, she nonetheless imbues the song with a note of chill warning.
(Buy Kathy!)

But it is Charlie Louvin, already an old man, who really nails it, gifting the melody with the nearest attention he can still muster, the ache and the breaks in his voice as painful as the collapsed lungs of those witnessing the reality first hand. This is from his release of the same year, 2008, "Charlie Louvin sings Murder Ballads and Disaster Songs", the title alone plunging out any glimmers of light in the darkness.
(Buy Charlie!)

By way of contrast, in a perhaps vainglorious attempt to update the song, 1985 saw Wall of Voodoo produce this travesty (TRAVISty?!), which fails on all levels, beyond perhaps rendering into tone the sheer monotony of hacking at a coalface in the deep and dank underground. (Well, some might like it.........)
(If you must!)

If you like this sort of stuff, you really need to get this. In fact, I insist. Read what AMG have to say about it.

Fiddle and Violins: Orange Blossom Special

Vassar Clements & the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band: Orange Blossom Special

[purchase]

I've danced around not posting any obvious songs this week, but heck with it. If we can't post Vassar Clements on fiddle week, then what can be said for us? And Orange Blossom Special is known as the fiddle player's national anthem, so it's a natural fit.

Will the Circle Be Unbroken was the first bluegrass album I'd ever heard, and it came courtesy of two of my college freshman roommates at the University of Michigan. Robyn played violin, but we made her play fiddle; Meryl played banjo, and me, well, I played guitar. What we lacked in talent we made up for in enthusiasm. Robyn especially liked to play this spirited song from her album at full volume at 7 in the morning after our other hallmates kept us awake until 2 am. (She liked to alternate this with Gregorian chants).

It might be easier to list musicians that Vassar Clements didn't play with over his long career, but here's a quick list of some of those he accompanied: Bill Monroe, John Hartford, Norman Blake, Earl Scruggs, the Grateful Dead, Jimmy Buffett, David Grisman, Dicky Betts, Paul McCartney, Stephane Grapelli, Woody Herman, and Linda Ronstadt. He was an early innovator in what's now called newgrass.

This album, both innovative and well-received in 1972, brought together many traditional bluegrass and country-western artists with the country rock group, the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band. It also introduced Clements to a broader audience, including Robyn, Meryl, me, and those hapless hallmates at U of M.

Spring & Flowers: Wildwood Flower

The Carter Family: Wildwood Flower [purchase]
Nitty Gritty Dirt Band: Wildwood Flower [purchase]
Joan Baez: Wildwood Flower [purchase]
Duane Eddy: Wildwood Flower [purchase]

Wildwood Flower is one of the classic American songs. Originally entitled "I'll Twine 'Mid the Ringlets," it was written by Maud Irving Joseph Philbrick Webster in 1860. The song has a very simple melody that will get stuck in your head.

The most popular recorded version is by The Carter Family. The version by the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band from the essential album Will The Circle Be Unbroken features Mother Maybelle Carter on vocals.

I like Joan Baez's traditionally folky interpretation from her first album--recorded in 1960 while she was still a teenager. Duane Eddy's twangy guitar rendition is also pretty cool.