Customer Reviews

Long Gone Dead

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The sharp lead guitar of Alejandro Escovedo isn't present for Rank and File's second lp, but "Long Gone Dead" is nearly as good as the debut. It's more layered than "Sundown", with some fiddles and pedal steel, but this works well within the framework of the songs. "The Sound of The Rain", Rank and File's best original song, is the album's centerpiece, but the rest, including a cover of Lefty Frizzel's "I'm An Old, Old Man", all sound fine. Stan Lynch of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers is the drummer for this outing.

Rank and File would record one more album after this, for Rhino, but it was quite lame (I don't know why Collector's Choice is even releasing it, or why "Long Gone Dead" and "Sundown" aren't combined). You could tell the band knew its career was at an end when the 3rd album's acknowledgements read simply, "Thanks, to no one."

Yeah, yeah, "Sundown" is just the pinnacle of awesomeness, and David Kahne knew how to get the Kinman brothers' sound to just echo and ring so wonderfully.
But this CD's really good too, despite Kahne's absence. Chip and Tony's songwriting skills are still as great as ever. The title track, "Hot Wind," "John Brown," "Sound of the Rain," "It don't matter" are especially good.

Having seen the Dils live and having watched the rebirth of the Kinman brothers as Rank and File, I always looked forward to their records. This album was a disappointment then and that still has not changed. The song writing is as good as ever. The problem is with the production. It reeks of early 80s overkill. The guitars are dressed up too much and the vocals overprocessed to the point that they sound too high. My daughter, when she heard it recently, thought Chip was a girl.

In this album's version of "Sound of the Rain", they change the original line "I don't listen to the cops, I wish they all were dead" to the milder "I don't listen to the cops, they talk with wood & lead."
That sums up what's wrong with this album, but "Long Gone Dead" (the song) is still great....