Air Mail Special

One of the most exciting times in American vernacular music (a term I’m preferring to “American roots music”) was the early 1950’s when bluegrass was in its early years. No one probably thought about it much in terms of categories in those days, but in retrospect its intriguing to listen to young Jim and Jesse McReynolds of Coburn, Virginia participate in the development of the bluegrass genre. In a sense, Jim and Jesse were influenced by Bill Monroe, the father of bluegrass, in two ways: as fans of his brother duets with brother Charlie aka The Monroe Brothers; and of course as disciples of bluegrass, the hot, new offshoot of country music created by Monroe, Flatt and Scruggs and others.

Air Mail Special Early Recordings 1952-1955 (on the Rebel Records of Canada label) covers the McReynolds boys earliest sides. Jim and Jesse had an arresting vocal blend. Jesse would become a respectable, underrated country vocalist, comfortable with the high lonesome songs, as well as straight up c&w. Jim was a haunting, high tenor harmony singer. On these early recordings the youth of Jim and Jesse is evident. They sound soulful but at times a little tentative. Over the years, their vocals would grow in confidence as their music became more powerful and driving. The other notable element of early Jim and Jesse is Jesse’s unique cross-picking mandolin style, a rolling sound influenced by the a banjo. Listen to him go to town on the opening track, “Air Mail Special.”

Now let’s pick up Jim and Jesse a decade on in their career with Jim and Jesse The Epic Bluegrass Hits (compiled on Rounder Records). By the mid-sixties, the Jim and Jesse sound is a well-oiled machine, a machine with soul, that is. Jesse’s voice has deepened, he sings with more authority. Jim’s high harmony cuts like a knife while sounding eternally youthful. The band plays with confidence, drive and swing. Everyone’s a pro.

Most of the tracks on this compilation were taken from two albums—Bluegrass Special and Bluegrass Classics—that I’ll discuss in more detail in the next entry. These were songs that they’d been playing for years or had recently been playing as part of their live show or their TV show. Thus the confidence and assurance. The material runs the gamut from the Louvin Brothers (“Are You Missing Me?; “I Wish You Knew”–Jim and Jesse were great interpreters of the Louvins and other country duo acts, such as the aforementioned Monroe Brothers, The Blue Sky Boys, and the Delmore Brothers), straight up country (“It’s a Long, Long Way to the Top of the World”) to fiddle tunes (“Stoney Creek”) to protest-style folk (“Cotton Mill Man”) to gospel numbers (“It’s a Long and Lonesome Road”). It tells you a lot about the place of bluegrass pros like Jim and Jesse in the mid-sixties: playing a smooth style of bluegrass that doesn’t move boffo units in the country music biz, but being invited to become members of the Grand Ol’ Opry. Yet their best selling single is “Cotton Mill Man,” which doubtless sold to many in the college folk protest crowd—not your usual Opry denizens. A wonderful compilation of “commercial” bluegrass from the mid-sixties.

Music for My Jewish Grandfathers

One of my grandfathers was a hard working guy from Brooklyn who was a first generation American. He built a successful costume jewelry wholesale business, invested wisely, was married happily for sixty six years until he passed away last summer. He was curious, opinionated and loved schmaltzy music. I know for a fact that he loved the record I’m about to discuss—Soul of a People, arranged and conducted by Gordon Jenkins—because he told me so a few years ago. This one’s for you, Victor!

Jenkins is best known for his work with Frank Sinatra, Judy Garland, and one of my favorites my Nat King Cole, Where Did Everyone Go? Jenkins was a master of the moody strings and woodwinds sound that hint at the darker side of the adult nineteen fifties cocktail hour scene. Jenkins’ facility with melancholic minor chords and mainstream adult pop make him ideal for this popular orchestral rendition of Jewish-themed tunes such as “Hava Nagila” and “My Yiddishe Mama.” I could just picture my grandfather playing this record when his mother was visiting. It’s Jews moving into the American mainstream music, looking back with nostalgia at the old neighborhood but glad to be in the middle class music. Jazzers Red Mitchell and Nick Fatool are among the lineup of musicians on this record. I wonder, was this recording a passion project for Jenkins or just a gig? In any case, it was $2.95 well spent.

My other grandfather Milton, was a songwriter. His best known composition—”Jim”—is something of a jazz standard. He was also the son of a synagogue cantor. Therefore, it only seems fitting to discuss A Centennial of Jewish Music by The New York Cantors Concert Ensemble with Milton in mind (although I have a feeling he might have dug the Gordon Jenkins record more). I’m a bad Jew. I know nothing about cantorial music and its traditions, but this record seems like a fair cross-section of Jewish vocal music from the nineteenth century to the twentieth. We can hear how traditional Eastern European Jewish music is influenced by the harmonics of Western classical music (of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries), and then later Israeli folk music, in this variety of compositions, performed by the above mentioned New York Cantors Concert Ensemble. I’m still learning…

Mammas Don’t Let Your Babies, etc.

The “up country” boys that fancied themselves cowboys and ruled the back of my high school bus often sang “Mammas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys” on the twenty five mile ride back home from school. I hated that song for a long time, associating it with being oppressed by lunkheads. Even after I started to love country music, I held this song at arm’s length. And in full disclosure, I took my time getting into Waylon and Willie, as if they were the ringleaders of that gang of sad losers at the back of my bus.

Over the past ten years, I’ve finally delved into the catalogues of Waylon and Willie and discovered that I was depriving myself of much enjoyment and inspiration by these two geniuses. Furthermore, I’ve come to realize the melancholy (albiet romantic melancholy) inherent in “Mammas,” and by extension the sadness of being a cowpoke who’s too afraid to get off the mountain. But perhaps I project…

Anyway, that’s my lead in for Waylon and Willie’s duel album, Waylon & Willie. For what was probably more than a bit of a commercial cash in effort/contractual obligation filler (and an excuse to snort mountains of cocaine), this is a pretty solid record. Despite the the embossed, “hand tooled” leather look of the cover that frames the painted portrait of our heroes and looks like one of those modern Jesus paintings from the seventies, despite the presence of the previously recorded by both Willie and Waylon “It’s Not Supposed to Be That Way” and “Pick Up the Tempo,” despite all that, it holds up pretty well.

Let’s talk about cocaine for a second. It’s interesting that the sole compositional collaboration between Waylon and Willie, “I Can Get Off on You,” begins with the line: Take back the weed, take back the cocaine, baby. The implication in this Jimmy Buffetesque trifle is that Willie and Waylon can get off on their ladies without all them mind alterin’ drugs and such, thank you very much. Probably something they cooked up when they were in the doghouse with their respective significant others (and no doubt, coke was somewhere in the mix). As Waylon quotes Willie in his memoir Waylon, “It (getting Waylon into trouble) keeps Waylon alert.”

The other coke song on this record is Stevie Nicks’s “Gold Dust Woman.” Yep, that’s right. And man, does Waylon gave it the full Waylon treatment. I think this song really spoke to him, he sings it like he means it—with tons of soul. My favorite song of the week.

Willie stands out on “If You Can Touch Her at All” and “A Couple More Years”—sing it, Willie!

This one’s for you, cowboys on the back of the bus!

Next Up: A couple of Jewish-themed records. My grandparents will be so proud!

Two Pretty Good Ones by Waylon

1973-1975 were some years for Waylon Jennings. He put out five or six fantastic records, three of them—Honky Tonk Heroes, This Time, Dreaming My Dreams—were stone classics. It’s only by the exalted standards of that trio of wax slabs that 1974’s Ramblin’ Man is just a so-so Waylon record. It’s a bit less subtle and seamless than those discs, but it’s got its fine moments: chief among them his cover of The Allman Brother’s “Midnight Rider.” It’s the perfect song for Waylon’s soulful bellow and his patented sound—that mix of Buddy Holly, blues, and Johnny Cash that I described in the previous post. The title track (not penned by Waylon) is more in the cliched Waylon Outlaw bag than “Midnight Rider,” but it doesn’t move me near as much. Waylon’s own “Rainy Day Woman” kicks ass. Those are the highlights from Side A.

While the ass-kickers reside on Side A, the sensitive side of Waylon, the balladeer resides on Side B. At this point in his career, Waylon knew his way around a ballad—he could caress a song with his voice as well as he could authoritatively bellow them out in his uptempo numbers. While I dig Waylon’s take on “Amanda” and some others on this side, they aren’t a patch on his ballad performances on This Time and Dreaming My Dreams. Pleasant enough stuff…

How live was Waylon Live? That’s what I wonder. Knowing what we know about the studio sweetening of so-called “live” albums (not to mention the information on the back cover which says the record was recorded “Live” in 1974. The record was released in 1976), we can wonder about overdubs, crowd noise and such. And RCA, notable for their horrible cover art, shows that every expense was spared with the cheesy, ten cent painted portraits of Waylon on the front cover. Ah, but who really cares? This probable cash-in on Waylon’s success (or contractual obligation filler) is a nice showcase for Waylon’s super live band, notably the fantastic steel guitarist Ralph Mooney. You can’t argue with the material—”T For Texas”; “Rainy Day Woman”; fine versions of Willie Nelson’s “Me and Paul” and “Pick Up the Tempo”; good interpretations of “House of the Rising Sun” and “Me and Bobby McGee”; Waylon doing a country weeper, “The Last Letter”; Waylon doing Waylon, “This Time.” Sure woulda been great to see ol’ Waylon “Live” back in 1974.