O California!
With her latest project, O California! bluegrass and folk legend Laurie Lewis and her band The Right Hands have released an album that reminds listeners why she has remained a force to be reckoned with and a standard bearer for roots music. The album pairs original songs with fresh takes on some old traditional songs and tunes. Lewis has assembled a tight band whose members not only accompany her but also take vocal and instrumental leads, evidence of a unified team with a shared vision.
With Lewis on guitar or fiddle, the accompaniment shifts from simplicity on “My True Love Loves Me” to full-out jamming on “Hell Broke Loose in Georgia” by Brandon Godman on fiddle, George Guthrie on banjo and guitar, Hasee Ciaccio on bass, with Sam Bush joining on mandolin.
The opening track, “Look Down That Lonesome Road,” begins with some of the familiar traditional lyrics, followed by new verses by Lewis that muse on goodbyes and heartbreaks, ending on a hopeful note:
. . . when we two once more will meet
We’ll make the mountains ring, my love
With all the songs we’ll sing.
The title track “O California!” with its Western flavor, pays homage to Lewis’ home state, whose unique beauty, she suggests, is missed by “the Eastern folks [who] come around saying all your hills are so ugly and brown.” The lyrics of the song don’t whitewash the problems there—infrequent rain, challenges to workers in necessary but low-paying and arduous, even dangerous, jobs—but it sings like a love song of longing and home. She sings of the trees native to the state—“oak, madrone and sequoia. . . Joshua, the juniper, redwood and fir,” following up with a promise:
I will not turn my back on this place, no matter the cost
I’ll stand and I’ll fight for my paradise lost.”
Ciaccio takes the opening vocal lead on this rendition of the timeless “Fair and Tender Ladies” with Lewis alternating verses and joining her on harmony, beginning acapella, followed by the introduction of a hint of banjo and then a plaintive fiddle. The simplicity of the accompaniment reinforces the warning tone of the song that speaks of the ephemeral nature of love, which “fades away like morning dew.”
Banjoist Guthrie delivers a strong vocal lead on “Red Rocking Chair,” another traditional song often associated with Doc Watson, with a strong banjo line throughout. “Hell Broke Loose in Georgia” is the only fully instrumental tune on the album.
The original tracks on the album, all but one written by Lewis, address timeless themes and take current concerns to a metaphorical and timeless level. “My True Love Loves Me,” with its roll call of birds enlisted to spread love’s good news, could easily pass for an old traditional song. The legendary Alice Gerrard, Lewis’ friend and mentor, contributed “The South Sweet Anna River,” another track that could easily be mistaken for a traditional ballad. The song ties perfectly with the themes of nostalgia for home and childhood and the acceptance of the passage of time. Death, never mentioned by name, appears as a river carrying her passenger, a queen telling her loved ones, “Don’t cry when I’m gone,” asking instead, “Won’t you sing to me as I take my leave?”
The upbeat “Wheel of Life” invites listeners, while they still can, to step out of their comfort zone and take a chance on life. The song opens with a carnival barker’s invitation to the “Ladies and Gentlemen” in the audience to step right up to hear her story, shifting into the bouncy chorus: “Step up to the Wheel of Life / If you don’t spin you’re never gonna win…” While she never claims there is nothing to fear in taking one’s chances, she lightly counts her gains: “I’m rich in my friends, and I still have my health, and, yes, folks, I’ve sung with Ralph Stanley.”
“Voices of the Water” is a sort of dreamscape, in which the voices of water speak of the interconnectedness of all lives and the natural world. Lewis reminds the listener, “Stronger by far are our ties to each other; like planets to their star, we are who you are.”
In “One Tiny Spark,” Lewis faces the issue of noise and light pollution in cities and recognizes the challenge in letting one’s own light be visible. The album ends on a hopeful note with what could be considered both a spiritual and secular hymn, “This Little Light of Mine.” Throughout the album, Lewis and the Right Hands keep the music clear and simple enough to let the message shine through.
