Reviews

THE LONESOME TRIO Sugar Hill Records SUG-CD-4110 A love of whiskey and bluegrass music drew together three students attending Ohio’s Oberlin College twenty-two years ago. Ed Helms (guitar and banjo), Ian Riggs (bass), and Jacob Tilove (mandolin), along with a few other musician buds played informal gigs on back porches, front yards, and basement keg…

RUSSELL MOORE & IIIrd TYME OUT IT’S ABOUT TYME Break A String BAS 2015 IIIrd Tyme Out’s latest album kicks off in high gear with a jaunty romantic lament, “I’m Leaving You And Fort Worth Too” (penned by bandleader Russell Moore), and from there it never lets up. Every one of these 14 songs is…

FLATT LONESOME RUNAWAY TRAIN Mountain Home MH16252 This is a near textbook example of what a top-rate recording from a top-rate band should be. Everyone involved, from the producers to the label to the bandmembers themselves, should be pleased with the results, and that should translate to even greater recognition for Flatt Lonesome. As most…

THE MUSIC OF WOODY GUTHRIE ARRANGED FOR FINGERSTYLE GUITAR BY FRED SOKOLOW—Stefan Grossman Guitar Workshop GW511. DVD, 101 min., $29.95. (Stefan Grossman Guitar Workshop, P.O. Box 802, Sparta, NJ 07871, www.guitarvideos.com.) While this DVD lies outside the domain of traditional bluegrass, it’s nonetheless a valuable lesson both in the songs of Woody Guthrie and in…

BLUEGRASS IN BALTIMORE: THE HARD DRIVIN’ SOUND AND ITS LEGACY BY TIM NEWBY—McFarland 9780786494392. Softcover, b&w photos, 244 pp. (McFarland & Co., Inc., P.O. Box 611, Jefferson, NC 28640, www.mcfarlandbooks.com.) Baltimore is not one of the first cities that comes to mind when you think about bluegrass. Yet, as Tim Newby’s Bluegrass in Baltimore reveals,…

SCOTT TACKETT LOOKING BACK Kindred Records KR15004 It’s surprising this terrific album apparently sat on the shelf for some four years, and there might be a double meaning to its name. The title song, “Looking Back,” is a great rowdy-life-to-prison-cell bluegrass burner, but singer/guitarist Scott Tackett also may have been looking back to the great…