Livin', Lovin', Losin': Songs of the Louvin Brothers

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Free Music Notes for Livin', Lovin', Losin': Songs of the Louvin Brothers

Free Music Review: The most beautiful music you'll ever hear & it's about time!
Hit: 5 Stars

The answer is that the New Bluegrass revival that was well underway before OH BROTHER, WHERE ART THOU....utilized all that emerging talent just exploded with the national attention from the original soundrtrack and the followup... DOWN FROM THE MOUNTAIN. Now that "New"Grass has so many talented musicians who pay their daily respects to the history they have dusted off, shined up and offered up for our mutual enjoyement.... there are finally enough savvy music buyers to make this CD a winning proposition.

Now, the Louvin Brothers didn't write all their songs, but their distinctive harmonies remain a standard against which all duets should be measured. It was a standard Gram Parsons strove to meet when he searched for and found his perfect "Girl Singer" , Emmylou Harris. That High Lonsome sound that so many musicians talk about today was perfected and promoted by a number of past Acts inlcuding the Louvins who sang sweet duets about the Devil's temptations ( Satan's Jewel Crown) as often as they turned their talents to a Boudleaux Bryant love song like " How's the World Treating You." (Co-written with the late great Chet Atkins, no slouch when it came to writing a pretty tunune himself)

On this CD, if I single out no other song, I must say that I was literally dumbstruck with awe the first time I heard the James Taylor/Alison Krauss version as its video played on a cable music station. I didn't even look.. I just closed my eyes and wept.. that's how perfect it is. To hear Taylor singing such sweet harmony to such a well-crafted song and not his recently overly earnest attempts at rekindling his old fandom on OCTOBER ROAD was simultainiously a relief and a tremendous pleasure. Alison's voice, which is light as a feather, pure and angelic matches the timbre and quality of his voice so well that one could be forgiven for assuming that God himself ordained the pairing. Seriously, this song deserves to run up the charts and stay there a good long time. It deserves that success not just because it is a timeless display of the simplicity of harmony in service of a sweet ballad but because it reminds us what we have NOT had for years on the country charts: Actual talent and memorable songs.

The other songs on this CD are equally well-paired with nary bum cut in sight. If anything, I hunger now more than ever for MORE, more, more Louvin Brothers Tribute CDs. Call this one Volume One folks and give us some more. I would have liked to seen Jeff Tweedy, Evan Dando and some of the other regulars of Alt Country try their hand with some other Louvin material. It would also have been nice to see some of the so-called Inventors of 'Country-Rock" like Chris Hillman, Roger McGuinn, Glenn Frey and even Barry Tachin. And lastly, why oh why are Bruce Springsteen & Patti Scialfa absent? A minor quibble, but the husband and wife rockers have more than proved their country chops in concert and on other performers' CDs. Bruce & Patti have done Bluegrass versions of some of his songs with harmonies so sweet & lovely, the breath leaves your body for a while. (For example: check out the live cut of "Mansion on the Hill" from the most recent Bruce LIVE album) Ah well, maybe on Volume II should there be one. No one Tribute CD can deliver every fan's dream parings of artists with songs. This is especially true with such touchstone artists as the Louvins. Even so, anyone would be delighted with what we have here.

So, all other minor quibbles, unreasonable desires & unfulfilled dreams aside, allow me to say the following:

To my mind, this CD and all the performances on it fell like Manna from the Heavens just as some of us were starving for harmonious sustanence as we wandered this musical desert searching for the promised land. Sustain us it shall and hopefully it will encourage a Boudleaux and Felice Bryant Tribute as well (they wrote many of the Everly Bros. best songs as well as "Love Hurts"). All I can say is,in the tradition of Dickens' Oliver Twist "Please, May I have some more?"

In the meantime, spread the word and enjoy each and every song, over and over. You might even lay this CD on your parents or grandparents if they, like my older family members, nearly cried for joy when the OH BROTHER... Soundtrack came out. This is THAT good. Enjoy!

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