Customer Reviews

One More in the Cabin

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

 

 

Anyone with an interest in the bluegrass scene today must admit that there is a tendency to equate instrumental speed with a top notch, high quality band that has an edge. Jim & Jennie and the Pinetops present a different kind of edge in the music. The old time FEELING edge. The high, harmonizing vocals. The great flow of a song. They have written 14 new songs that have the feeling that they could have been written 50 years ago.

The opening track "Driving Rain" kicks this project off with a bang. It immediately grabs your attention and forces you to take note. The CD proceeds to bounce to and fro between old time bluegrass and old-timey music. Jim's vocals are engrossing and Jennie's are very good. Add into the mix Emma's powerful, absorbing fiddle and you have the base for the great band. Bradford Hutchison's 3 finger banjo adds graciously to the mix.

This CD is enjoyable and leaves you with the impression that the group is having a ton of fun. I have seen them in person and believe this to be so. They provided a great show and this CD has the feeling of their live shows even though it is a studio project. They enjoyed picking with the campers late into the night when I saw them at a festival. Showing their joy of this music. I enjoyed listening to them and will never forget the night they played at my campsite(especially since Emma's dog bit me) and look forward to enjoying their live show and off-stage night picking soon. But until I can, this CD will satisfy me.

The only reason I give this four stars is that they have a bit of room to improve but I must say that they have come a long way in a short time and they present a modern day version of what our parents saw in the early days when this music was taking shape.

Buy this CD and enjoy it.

It's hard to believe that these perfectly-crafted old-time-ish tunes were not in fact written by some mistily-remembered contemporary of the Carter Family or Grandpa Jones, but rather by a bunch of modern urban hipsters from Philadelphia who just happen to have an uncanny grasp of the oddball mountain music of the early 20th Century. They get the constrained emotionality and matter-of-fact narrative tone just right, as well as the subject matter -- song after song starts with a familiar set-up, and it's really only until you open the CD booklet that you can be sure that these songs were actually written by the band. These folks aren't hotshot superpickers, and they purposefully sing all raspy and offkey, yet unlike oh, so many of their twangcore contemporaries, the Pinetops don't come off as pretentious dilettantes. Rather, this is a band that is respectful and utterly in command of the genre they've adopted, and their material is emotionally resonant and entirely convincing. In fact, I'd say that if at least some of these songs don't work their way into the official bluegrass canon, something is seriously wrong in the world. Highly recommended!

When I first heard this CD I didn't know if it was a rerelease of an old album or not. Upon doing a little research I learned that these are all new releases of original songs by the group. I like that old time sound and feel and am looking for more of this kind of music.

I highly recommend.