Customer Reviews

Sisters

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

 

 

All I can say is WOW. These two girls are nothing short of amazing. I saw them live last year at the Christopher Run Bluegrass festival in Virgina...and they knocked my socks off. Talk about your mulit talented musicians. These two can play about any instrument in the bluegrass circuit. And their voices...... whew.....they're heavenly. I rank them right up there with Alison herself. Alison Krauss that is. If you like Angelic voices and bluegrass music...buy this one. It's a keeper.

... and it's "damn, what a shame." For the Stevens Sisters' pitch-perfect cover of Steve Earle's "My Old Friend the Blues" alone, this is an album well worth owning and turning to again and again. But fortunately there's much more here. Beautifully matched voices, a flawless feel for the material and heartening simplicity are only starters. This is real country done real well.

Beth and April grew up listening to different kinds of music, but especially to bluegrass, the main ingredient of their music. Two other major influences on them were blues and country and these influences are apparent on this album.

The album includes covers of Wishful thinking (first recorded by Joy White), My old friend the blues (Steve Earle), In my time of dying (the sisters based their version on Led Zeppelin's), Tomorrow is forever (written by Dolly Parton and recorded by her as a duet with Porter Wagoner) and When we're gone we're gone (O'Kanes).

Betty Elders wrote Bed of roses. Although there have been different songs with this title, I don't remember hearing this one before. The other songs are all originals that they wrote themselves, some of which are very personal.

After releasing this exciting debut, it was five long years before the follow-up, the equally exciting Little by little was released, which I've already reviewed.. It was well worth the wait, but I hope we don't have to wait another five years before they release their third album.

Very good! It is rare I give any thing a 5 star, but this desurved it.
the singing was great.

This album is one I've pulled out again and again for more than ten years. If you're like me, the special albums are the ones like B. B. King's "Blues on the Bayou" or Johnny Staat's "Wires and Wood" or Carole King's "Tapestry," albums that you can listen through, from first track to last, and enjoy every cut. Most albums are little more than one or two singles wrapped in deadwood; this album is varied yet consistently excellent, with the sisters' original songs holding their own with the covers--and the covers, in their own way, are as strong as the recordings by the original artists. This isn't a "bangin' banjos" bluegrass album; great natural-sounding vocals over well-set arrangements. Highly recommended!

Okay, I admit it: I don't actually own this album. I do, however know April Stevens (Singleton) and she's a really great person. I have heard her sing and she has an incredible voice. Beth is also very talented. I have listened to this album and I think bluegrass lovers will throughly enjoy it.