Customer Reviews

Gravity's Our Enemy

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

 

 

One of the best newgrass albums of the last couple of month. Listen and enjoy.

It's impossible for me to pick which of Cadillac Sky's albums are my favorite. While I fell in love with them listening to their newest album, "Letters in the Deep," this one is certainly awesome.

For some great breathtakingly gorgeous instrumentals, check out "Thank you, Esteban." Also listen to the heartbreaking narrative in "Bible by the Bed"-The story of an abused woman still full of love for God and her husband. Two sweet, catchy songs on the album that will see much love from your speakers, are "Carousel" (Which lends the album it's name with the line, "Gravity's our enemy the world won't weigh us down.")and "Baby Don't Cry" (that might be the best fighting-with-your-significant-other/love song ever).

"Gravity..." it truly a treat for your mind, ears and soul.

Since hearing Cadillac Sky at Merlefest this year I've purchased all of their albums. Their harmony, musicianship, and heartfelt picking is second to none. These guys remind me of Newgrass Revival "resurected".
Every song sounds like they live it and believe in it rather than just add it to the album. My favorite new grass group.

More than any other group, Cadillac Sky, "The Duhks" new CD is close to this mix of music. Their first CD was more contemporary bluegrass like The Gibson Brothers. I always give a listen with headphones to a CD I review , the one sheet recommends this for this CD.
Mendelsohn at Georgetown Masters masters this recording to HDCD which really does not make sense to me, because there is a lot of clipping especially on the first half of the CD. It is recorded and mixed at three different places and there are many places where the vocals shine, it is a shame that the recording quality is poor in places.
"Thank You Estaban" is an instrumental track with a nice sound with minimal clipping. Some real nice shimmering acoustic guitar, fiddle, banjo and mandolin.
This CD is a classic example of the fact, you cannot just take anything to the mastering engineer and he'll fix it up, not true. They can do alot, but not with a track recorded too loud.
Track eight, "Inside Joke" is an upbeat tune that finally is clean, very interesting vocals and instrumentation.
Track Nine, " Everybodys' Favorite" has a very clean and acoustic sound, then changes to a different sound totally. About a young lady who has to escape the spotlight to find happiness.
The rest of this disc has a nice clean sound, don't know what happened to the first songs with the clipping, could have been a problem with one of the studios. I don't know if Earl Scruggs would care for this, but the roots are definitely bluegrass.
Personally, I liked their first CD better, though the change to more of a jam band bluegrass sound is very interesting. There are some very good songs here

Their fist CD "Blind Man Walking" is not a prefect CD, but it was a great representation of progressive bluegrass done with passion and a bunch of well written tunes. "Gravity's Our Enemy" finds Cadillac Sky stretching the boundaries of what is a bluegrass tune by using bluegrass instruments, odd time signatures and vocal manipulation. Nothing wrong with this on the surface, but it they show little ability to make it work. The straight ahead numbers are good, and solid, but the inclusion of the other tunes just makes this CD a hard listen from start to finish. Buy Blind Man Walking first, and if you really love it give this a try.

I really enjoyed Blind Man Walking. This new album, though, I find I am not enjoying it at all which is a shame. The actual execution of the music is excellent but the songs are not enjoyable (who wants to listen to the detailed account of a woman being beaten by her drunken husband to the point where she shoots him and is kneeling over his bleeding corpse?)
Baby Don't Cry is the only winner on this album, the rest can go. Majestic Swan and Thank You Esteban are decent instrumentals but are too jazzy and unstructured for my tastes.