http://www.ravenrecords.com.au
It is great to see Raven giving ‘the songwriter’s friend’ Bobby Bare another release, and though the 51 track compilation is littered with usual suspects a bunch of them that you just want to hear again and again. I am talking about songs “Shame On Me“, “Detroit City”, “500 Miles From Home” and “Four Strong Winds” from his early RCA days. Then moving on through more such classics as his definitive version of Cowboy Jack Clement and Tompall Glaser tune “Streets Of Baltimore”, although I am also a huge fan of Gram (Parsons) and Emmylou’s (Harris) version Bare takes some beating. Tom T. Hall’s “That’s How I Got To Memphis” is another that’s seen a few good covers, but Bobby took every song he did of the Storyteller to his heart, hence he made them that little bit more special. ‘Margie’s) At The Lincoln Park Inn” is another, and though he does also cover Tom T’s “The Year Clayton Died” he can’t attain to the mercurial heights of Hall, but who could! But he does the likes of “The Long Black Veil” (Marijohn Wilkin, Danny Dill) proud, and a little selection of Kris Kristofferson songs justice. His working of “Help Me Through The Night” is a really good one, although I have always liked his version of “Darby’s Castle” better than anything he did by him (and it failed to make the cut!
Bare in the form of cartoonist, writer and general genius Shel Silverstein had a man to provide him with a wealth of terrific songs, 14 alone are to be found here.
Rich in energy, humour and innovative flare they range from “The Mermaid”, “Marie Laveau”, “The Winner”, “Greasy Grit Gravy”, “The Jogger” among others, and then you have his stellar versions of Guy Clark’s “New Cut Road”, Hugh Moffatt’s “Praise The Lord, And Send Me The Money” and Bob McDill’s “South Of The South”. There are others too, and all of them every bit as good; Dick Feller’s “Some Days Are Diamonds (Some Days Are Stone)”, plus an early cover of Don Schlitz’s “The Gambler” and stellar version of Dr. Hook hit “Sylvia’s Mother”. It being yet another from the incredibly good and prolific Silverstein, he even wrote all the material for Bare’s famed double album Lullabys, Legends & Lies (RCA). Enjoy, country music doesn’t get much better than this.
Maurice Hope