Durham, NC's Jake Xerxes Fussell and Toronto's Lonesome Ace Stringband each owe a bit to Roscoe Holcomb's take of "Hills of Mexico"
Sez Jake Xerxes Fussell...
“Hills of Mexico” is one of many narrative ballads where the singer-narrator is approached by a stranger in transit with a business proposition that turns out to be not so great for singer-narrator. Many of the European ballads of this kind deal with highwaymen and their exploits, mostly in the 17th and 18th centuries. In this particular (19th century) instance the proposition entails going to Mexico to work the cattle drive. Many regional variants from this family, alternately known as “The Trail of the Buffalo,” have been sung in a variety of musical contexts and communities. My version borrows heavily from Roscoe Holcomb’s narrative, which is mysterious in that it omits the Mexico part itself almost entirely.
Thanks to Kevin McNamee-Tweed for the artwork: “Steamboat,” 2018, Glazed ceramic, 9.25” x 7”.
In January, Toronto's Lonesome Ace Stringband raised the roof of the Deep End Ranch in Santa Paula which you can see below. Get their music right here.
Simone Schmidt performs songs inspired by the stories of women inmates at Kingston's Rockwood Asylum.
Simone Schmidt, aka Fiver, is a Toronto-based musician working within the frame of traditional North American folk music. Her latest album Audible Songs From Rockwood is a series of eleven fictional field recordings, gathered from case files of patients at the Rockwood Asylum for the Criminally Insane between 1854-1881.
The rigour of Schmidt’s writing process is shown through the work: Over the course of two years, Schmidt researched the asylum's primary documents – patient files, architectural diagrams, superintendents' diaries – spinning her findings into historical fiction and, from there, into song. The voices on the record are crafty, witty, evasive, despondent, and lucid. Audible Songs From Rockwood shapes its subject matter with wit, optimism, sadness, and even joy. Using an acoustic sonic pallet and working with some local heavies in the old time folk tradition – John Showman, Max Heineman, Chris Coole, Kristine Schmidt – and highly skilled instrumentalists – cellist Cris Derksen and Blood Ceremony's Alia O’Brien – the performances gives voice to people living in the margins of history.
The album is accompanied by a book created by fictional ethnomusicologist, Simone Carver, written in the style of the liner notes of Smithsonian Folkways compilations. It includes lyrics and supplemental information about the historical context of the inmates and their songs along with original artwork by Darby Milbraith, Geneva Hailey, Jennifer Castle, Jeff Bierk and Julianna Neufeld. The package carries questions about the archive as an apparatus of colonial power, definitions of sanity and criminality, and the early settler-colonial agenda foundational to those modes of thought still operating in today’s carceral system. Watch the mini-documentary shot by Colin Medley followed by Meg Remy's video for the song Mouser. Audible Songs From Rockwood is available in various formats from idée fixerecords which you can get right here.
Fiver is at St. Matthew's United Church (729 St. Clair West) Friday at 7:30pm (now sold out);
also at Array Space(155 Walnut Ave) Saturday at 9:30pm, $15.
Toronto's unstoppable bluegrass force, the Foggy Hogtown Boys, have always been better known for their super-tight ensemble play than their sense of humour but don't be fooled by the clean-cut stage presentation and all that ridiculously proficient picking. Once the house lights come up and their stringed companions are put to bed, Chris Quinn, Andrew Collins, John Showman, Chris Coole and Max Heineman are inveterate cut-ups and it's about time folks outside the group's small circle of elbow-bending buddies knew it.
For their new self-released Scotch & Sofa disc – which they'll be unveiling at their release party on Friday (June 11) at Hugh's Room (2261 Dundas West) – the typically neat 'n' tidy Foggy Five decided to get down 'n' dirty for their high concept CD sleeve photo shoot with hilarious results. It all fits perfectly with their chosen repertoire for the album which delves into the tried and true themes of drinking, gambling, rambling and cheating. It's just the sort of stuff that once made for classic country songs way back in the days before Nashville's finest left the honky tonks for hot tubs. But then, these hombres have made a career out of being more country than country.
The great thing about the Foggy Hogtown Boys is that while they remain deeply immersed in old-school bluegrass tradition, enough to still have their Bill Monroe moments on Scotch & Sofa along with nods to the Stanley Brothers and Flatt & Scruggs, they're anything but bound by it. Listen closely and you'll also hear the influence of Jimmie Rodgers and maybe a little Papa Charlie Jackson too. Over the course of making five albums without interference from producers or labels, they've developed a uniquely Canuck approach to playing the bluegrass and old-time music they love which is somehow simultaneously both rootsier and more adventurous than what's currently being done by their similarly banjo-driven Southern counterparts.
Each virtuosic member continues to have numerous simultaneous side-projects on the go but that hasn't undermined what they do together as the Foggy Hogtown Boys. In fact, just the opposite is true as demonstrated by the broad range of song styles and structures on Scotch & Sofa which you simply won't encounter on contemporary bluegrass recordings. And if the sleeve images are any indication, they're still having a great time doing it.
Get In Line Brother at the Almonte Old Town Hall on Feb 6, 2010
