Customer Reviews

Feels Like the Third Time

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I do not particularly like country music. Never have during my thirty years. But after pleasantly dangling my feet in the alt country creek frequented by Wilco, Palace, Golden Smog, et al., I wanted to be submerged in a deeper, muddy creek whose every drop tasted like unadulterated country. But where to turn? From Urban Cowboy to Dearth Brooks, Nashville has foisted upon a corruptible world their bastardized version of country music. Nashville (and most of the recording industry for that matter) has learned how to churn out the same bad songs over and over and make millions by simply placing them in different colored wrapping paper each time. The preponderance of this dreck, which could possibly be alleviated by a couple of surgical strikes courtesy of Saddam Hussein were he not, thankfully, as incompetent as those running Nashville, can lead one to believe that no real country music is being made today. Do not fret, though, for Freakwater's country-folk is here to warm your frigid bones with their aching fire. Feels Like the Third Time is not the best Freakwater album (hence four stars although four and a half are necessary), but it is a good departure point. It is the first one that is still available on which they stretch out and do most of the songwriting, although the earlier Dancing Under Water does contain some fine songe. Feels Like the First Time feels as if it was composed and played on a rural porch somewhere in Appalachia, even though the recording quality is just fine. Dominated by acoustic and slide guitar, bass, fiddle, mandolin, pedal steel and warm harmonies provided by Catherine Ann Irwin and Janet Beveridge Bean, this album is, save for a slightly more skeletal sound, similar to the rest of Freakwater's albums: as intoxicating and pure as grain alcohol. Completely devoid of pretension or vanity, the heart of this and all Freakwater albums resides in the disparate voices of the two women, childhood friends from Kentucky. Irwin has a deep, earthy voice that drips with plaintive emotion. Bean's voice sounds delicate and pure, often as if it's floating on ether above the worldly heartache, misery and death contained in the lyrics, even though it's obvious she's no more immune to pain than Irwin. Each voice is rich and emotive in its own right, but when they harmonize, my first impulse is to curl up and cry at the beauty of it all. Freakwater may sing of a world filled with pain and struggle with no hope of salvation, but if salvation exists, these ladies, and even fulltime bass player David Wayne Gay, should be escorted through the pearly gates with no questions asked, even though one feels they might rather be grounded in the earth, six feet under. Freakwater is a GREAT band and this is a very good record. Buy them all and collect and trade them with your friends. Just listen to any of the first three tracks or the fifth one and you can't help but be sucked into Freakwater's dark, aching world. If most of the alt country bands out there heard Freakwater, they'd probably quit on the spot, knowing they could never achieve the perfect Americana cultured on parts of this album and fully distilled on Old Paint and Springtime. They likely wouldn't enjoy being taught a few things about making real music by a couple of women either. The fact that this band is still relatively obscure is a true injustice.

This can only be considered a four-star record if it is thought of in comparison to some of their other releases (see esp. _Springtime_). The brilliance here is five-star on any other scale. Freakwater is like no other existing band, and every one of their records deserves prolonged attention. Their arrangements strike straight to the heart, their covers are well-selected, and when they set to writing--especially when it's Catherine Irwin doing the writing--the result is often poetry. Start with this record and do not end until you've listened to everything by them. There are no gaps.

I believe this to be the best Freakwater disc. The quality of the songs is consistently high and the musical execution is near-perfect. Whereas much of the FW canon tends to have as much of a folk vibe as a country sound, this release is pretty much pure twang. The ladies' harmonies are gorgeous, and bring to mind the great Hazel Dickens. A definite must-have for alt-country fans. OH, a great cover photo also!!