Cover Lay Down

The folkworld is rich with young artists these days, and with their heroes and forebears; head out to any major summer festival, and you’ll find the full mix, from long-established sixties folkies to mid-career singer-songwriters my own age, from second- and third-album folkies in their late twenties working hard to prove that they have the stamina and talent to sustain the buzz to emerging newbies who tend towards the young and the restless.

Less common, however, is the musician or band that breaks into the scene later in life. It’s an oft unspoken truism in music that starting out is for the young. But even as the mix of voices is new to us, artists who emerge in the prime of their lives also provide an audible comfort — with their natural abilities, with the music, and with the material — which can only come with maturity.

Today, we feature three relatively new bands comprised of older musicians who have only recently banded together. All sport a touch of grey, which can be a disadvantage in any market. All trend towards different ends of the folk spectrum, as befits our broad definition of the folkworld here on Cover Lay Down. But all share a rare combination of early career optimism and that confidence which results from years of self-reflection and self-awareness. The result is a diverse trio of new artists with nothing to prove, making a gentle sort of music that aims not for pop-production perfection, but something deeper and more authentic, and eminently folk.

The two married couples who comprise the aptly-named Return to the Dream came together after years in the business found them each losing sight of the dreams and inspiration that had first led them to music. The result of this reexamined life: a quartet that produces gentle, uncomplicated folk steeped in the earnest, spiritual optimism of the folk school of Peter Mayer or Kallet, Epstein and Cicone, with a light touch on the acoustic guitar-driven instrumentation, honest male voices alongside female lead and harmony vocals that recall the best vibrato-laden tunes from a mid-career Judy Collins or Maria Muldaur, and lyrics which primarily deal with quiet themes of deep understanding and deep connection to love, community, and the world at large.

Their choices of covers on the album fit neatly within this worldview, most especially their light-handed treatment of Blind Faith classic Can’t Find My Way Home, which finds new life here as an honest reflection on the journey that brought their well-penned inspirational originals and rediscovery of the core of folk music to life. Their self-titled and self-released debut Return to the Dream drops September 30th, and comes highly recommended.

• Return to the Dream: Can’t Find My Way Home (orig. Blind Faith)
• Return to the Dream: Mother’s Spiritual (orig. Laura Nyro)
  (from Return to the Dream, 2009)

Melbourne-based trio The Mercurials was formed when long-time blues and rock collaborators Mark Ferrie and Andrew Pendlebury, looking for a new sound, found Israeli cellist and vocalist Adi Sappir busking outside the subway in 2004. Since then, the band has released two albums, with a third still at the pressing plant, and the slow, bluesy acoustic folk rock which they have adopted shows both an unsurprising maturity and a genuine pleasure in making music which lets each note linger, a pulsing, fluid songcraft which washes over the listener like slow waves.

There’s shades of the languid, atmospheric best of the Cowboy Junkies in their covers of Nick Drake and Bob Marley, something of the ragged glory of an acoustic Lou Reed in the interplay of cello and ageless vocals on Dylan’s You Angel You (found on their out-of-print debut; available for free on their downloads page), and a mellow yet focused vibe throughout both covers and originals here. Redemption Song will appear on upcoming Mercurials album Silver and Gold, which drops via their website on Oct. 11, and seems well worth the wait; in the meantime, head over to pick up their all-originals 2008 album Tangents and a few choice downloadables.

• The Mercurials: Redemption Song (orig. Bob Marley)
  (from Silver and Gold; available October 11, 2009)

• The Mercurials: Time Has Told Me (orig. Nick Drake)
• The Mercurials: Neon Lights (orig. Kraftwerk)
  (from The Mercurials, 2005 [out of print])

The loose acoustic gypsy jazz swing of Gumbo, newly discovered by fledgling label Wild Rose Artists, includes clarinet and flute to compliment the guitar and bass, but their sound nonetheless sports shades of Hot Tuna or Garcia and Grisman in their best and most mellow later days, pushing ragged glory from a series of well-penned originals and classic pre-war tunes. Upbeat and joyous, more than anything else, this trio with over a century of experience under its collective belt sounds happy to be here, still making new records after years of work with other ensembles, still around to celebrate the world through fine “vintage Americana” music.

Gumbo’s debut album Never Tell Me To Quit, which can be sampled in its entirety over at internet radio-on-call delivery system Jango, is built around the original songwriting of guitarist and lead vocalist Sid Beam, who played in seminal folk group Magpie in the mid seventies, and the experienced support of wind instrumentalist and vocalist Joe Casprowiak and the jazz-trained bass-and-vocalist David Fournier. Like Sid’s originals, the album closer, a hugely fun cover of American blues and jazz standard Happy Feet, partners exceptional material with outstanding delivery; here, on this and two other songs at least a generation older than I am, the stew of experience and musicianship that is Gumbo shows its chops, proving that you’re never too old to come back to the fold, the fore, or the folk.

• Gumbo: Happy Feet (orig. from the King of Jazz soundtrack)
• Gumbo: Money (orig. Stan Freberg)
• Gumbo: Porter’s Love Song (pop. Fats Waller et. al.)
  (from Never Tell Me To Quit, 2009; click on Gumbo at the bottom of the flash page to reveal purchase links and band details)

Cover Lay Down publishes new coverfolk sets and features Wednesdays, Sundays, and the occasional otherday. Coming soon: songs featuring the number nine.