Labor Of Lust
You could call Kyle Tuttle, longtime member of Molly Tuttle’s band Golden Highway, the Jimi Hendrix of the banjo.
On his second album of mostly original songs (based on what he describes in the accompanying press material “the ups and downs of love and loss [and] … some very high times and some very low ones”), he uses various amplifiers, pedals and effects to coax all manner of new-age tones and timbres out of his instrument.
Labor of Lust at times conveys an almost manic rock energy with Tuttle churning out his clever, fast-paced and often soul-searching lyrics over hard-driving and intricate walls of sound.
A case in point is his delightfully rocked and revved-up reimagining on the Earl Scruggs classic “Ground Speed.” On the track, he plays a Davidson electric banjo through a Fender tube amp while accompanist Duncan Wickel runs his fiddle through a Leslie speaker and Max Johnson plays a “burning hot fuzz” solo on his electric bass.
“Scorch on the Porch” and “The Ghost Who Loved Me” (described in the accompanying media material as an “electric funk jam”) has a similar hard-rocking techno vibe.
Tuttle, who comes out of the wing of neo-progressive bluegrass jam bands embodied by groups like Leftover Salmon and Yonder Mountain Stringband, is joined by a host of collaborators. These include, among many, Lindsay Lou, Cody Kilby, Geoff Saunders, Travis Book of the Infamous Stringdusters and Golden Highway bandmate Dominick Leslie.
Along with all his electronic bombast, there are elements of humor and playfulness in his music, as well as a discernible foundation in traditional bluegrass. On the whimsical “Trailer in Boulder Canyon,” for instance, he vividly dreams of a mountain get-away far from the daily grind.
He also brings a wistful back-porch dreaminess to his cover of Harry Nilsson’s “Turn On Your Radio.”
On “Hard to Say,” the first single from Labor of Lust, Tuttle reels off a classic line about love and loss: Knowing that it’s gone and gone for good, Makes you wonder what the hell you’re waiting on; It seems like such a short time to be here and a long time to be gone.
All in all, what Tuttle does here is at times delightfully off-the-wall and over the top. It’s also groundbreaking and makes for exciting listening.
