The Lost Chord #4: The Louvin Brothers and Others

In 1958, The Louvin Brothers had an epiphany, a revelation: if God is real, they decided, then, the devil must be as well. They went into a Nashville studio with producer Ken Nelson and the result was Satan Is Real, as gothic-sounding a concept album as ever came out of Nashville. Dark as Flannery O'Connor but without the grace of humor. If Edgar Allan Poe and Sylvia Plath had hooked up and had some musical twins, their progeny might have chosen these songs to record. Satan Is Real is ostensibly a religious album but it depicts a curiously gothic, unforgiving religion, as if the most threatening parts of the Old Testament have been set to harmonious and beautiful music. The Louvin Brothers have news for you about your soul, and it is not good news. In fact, it's downright dire. The straight and narrow is more narrow than straight. Woe betide the folks who fall by the wayside. The album was originally released in 1959, and the cover art became instantly notorious: Ira and Charlie, in their ornate white Nudie-like suits, are posed before the engulfing flames of hell. Their arms are outstretched in beckoning gestures as if they're welcoming you to the fire. The red devil, leering and cross-eyed, stands behind Ira, pointing the handle of his pitchfork at him. It probably gave a few '50s kids bad dreams and people who saw it as children remember it well today.

That the devil on the cover appears to be singling out Ira seems strangely prophetic since from all accounts, he was a nasty piece of work. Evil-tempered and racist and alcoholic, and so volatile that even his brother Charlie ultimately left him. Ira was even abusive towards the young Elvis Presley, who was touring with him before his career exploded, denigrating his music and calling him particularly vile epithets. Elvis should have kicked his ass, but he apparently had too many ingrained good manners, and he let it slide. Often drunk and unmanageable, Ira was smashing mandolins before Peter Townshend ever picked up a guitar. Ira died in a car crash at forty-one, struck, in an ironic touch, considering his own drinking problem, by a drunk driver. By then, the brothers had broken up and Charlie was carving out a successful solo career.

None of this affects the beauty of this music.

The brothers started out on an Alabama farm, singing harmony with each other and with their family, who were deeply religious, ingrained with the Baptist faith. They continued perfecting their harmony which some critics believe influenced The Everly Brothers and, ultimately, The Beatles. They formed gospel groups and toured with quartets but never really broke through until they turned toward secular music, having huge hits with songs like, "My Baby's Gone" and "You're Running Wild."

There's nothing secular here. Most of these songs were written or co-written by Ira and Charlie, hard songs with no give to them. Another ironic touch: They're particularly hard on drunkards (a word you don't hear much anymore). The wages of drunkenness are severe, on "The Drunkard's Doom," one of its byproducts is the death of a child. (The song oddly seems to consider this a small price to pay just for seeing the evil of your ways, getting right with religion, and saving your own soul.)

Among musicians, the Louvin fans were legion, and they included folkies and rock musicians, as well as country performers. Gram Parsons chose the austere "The Christian Life" for his outing with The Byrds, Sweetheart of the Rodeo. It would be interesting to know what Ira had to say about long-haired, dope-smelling hippies singing his song. But he might have doubtless cashed the royalty checks anyway.

Now the folks at Light in the Attic Records have given this one the deluxe treatment it deserves—not satisfied with re-releases as just re-releasing the album, with Satan Is Real, they include forty-page book and a second CD called Handpicked Songs, which contains Louvin Brothers songs chosen by fourteen contemporary musicians like Kris Kristofferson, Beck, and M. Ward. (Tracks chosen are the original Louvin recordings, not new performances by their selecting artists.)

The tribute album comes off a little less gothic than Satan Is Real, most of the performers going for the beautiful harmony in secular songs like "You're Running Wild" or plaintively mourning a lover in "My Baby's Gone," although "Are You Afraid to Die" and "Knoxville Girl," a murder ballad about a girl getting knocked in the head, are not exactly cheerful. Of particular interest here is Beck's choice, "The Great Atomic Power," which sounds like a bizarre souvenir from the early duck-and-cover days of Tthe Cold War, with its promise of mushroom clouds and storms of fire and death raining down from the skies. The Louvins sound as if they can hardly wait.

But the album also sounds like an urgent warning from the past, from a South that doesn't exist anymore. A time when the world was more regional and communication wasn't instantaneous. The characters on this album have their ear closer to the ground: all they have is the hope of being redeemed, and all they have to look forward to is the hope of heaven, and the only possible way there is the severe austerity of the Christian Life. The Louvins' security comes through on every song. Nobody's kidding around here—an eternity in hell is serious business. There is true redemption in the dark and simple beauty of the music.

Lucinda Williams: Blessed (Lost Highway, 2011)

Lucinda Williams has been around for a while, and I've been listening to her since I fell in love with "Big Red Sun Blues" many years ago, as well as "Nothin'" and "Ramblin' On My Mind," which someone sent me on a mixed tape, and which I played until the tape wore out. This album, Blessed, has the feel of a major statement, and to me, it's a return to form—tougher and edgier sounding songs than her recent albums.

Williams's credentials are impeccable—she played Gerde's Folk City in the Village, been kissed on the cheek by Bob Dylan, and toured with Van Morrison. She has said that she grew up in a household in which poets and novelists and musicians were always hanging out, since her father was the poet Miller Williams. And maybe if the poet's gift is stringing words together, then the poet's eye for seeing things can be inherited after all. 

As you might know, her first big break in music came when Mary Chapin Carpenter covered "Passionate Kisses," a song that was a huge hit for Carpenter and subsequently won Williams a Grammy for songwriting. In 1998 came Williams's Car Wheels on a Gravel Road, an instantly iconic album, with success both critically and commercially. It won Williams her first Grammy as a performer and probably still sells in an incredibly impressive number. Car Wheels on a Gravel Road was a hard act to follow.

Williams has also said that she's going through a prolific period as a songwriter, and the best songs on Blessed can stand up to most anything she's written in the past. Or that most anyone else has written, for that matter. One of the first things you notice about the record is the production—presumably the effect of Don Was, who co-produced. She's also helped immeasurably by the guitar work of Elvis Costello, who does some country-mode Rolling Stones strumming on "Soldier's Song," and contributes steely Neil Young solos that are deft as guitar solos get.

The guitars serve as a complement to one of the stand-outs, "Seeing Black," an angry song directed at a friend who chose to get off the ride by suicide: "Did evil triumph over love, was it hard to pull the plug?" Layered guitars ultimately give the song an epic, stately sound, and Williams sounds as if she really wants to know. She's said she's not writing as many kiss-off bad-boy songs as she used to, but "Buttercup," the first track, is a nice one: "You might have a beautiful mouth / you might have beautiful eyes / but sooner or later it all goes south when you tell too many lies." Maybe the quantity has fallen off but definitely not the quality.

Hear This! "Blessed" by Lucinda Williams

Various Artists: The 1861 Project, Volume 1: From Farmers to Foot Soldiers (2011)

People who have obsessions and act on them are usually interesting people, Nashville songwriter/producer Thomm Jutz is no exception. Born in Germany, Jutz fell in love with country music while listening to the radio and, by extension, in love with the culture of the American South in general. He arrived in the United States ten or so years ago, became involved in the country-music field, playing guitar for Americana musicians like Mary Gauthier, and obtained his American citizenship during the process of writing and recording this album. Asked by a friend who was thinking about doing a Civil War album if he had any Civil War songs, Jutz just wrote one, "The South's on Fire." And the next day, he and a friend wrote "Standing By My Own." He wrote or co-wrote twenty-one songs (seventeen of which appear on this album). When the friend abandoned the project, Jutz decided to do the concept album himself. He enlisted fellow friends and musicians like Marty Stuart and John Anderson, who were enthusiastic about the idea, and the result is sort of a folk history of the downfall of the American South. Jutz had long been thinking about the Civil War and was fascinated by its long-term effects on Southern creativity, especially writing (see the works of William Faulkner). In the South, the War was always present, looming over everything, and it wasn't going anywhere. 

Mostly acoustic with lots of guitars and mandolins, the album has an authentic feel of aural history, but the stories are more personal than simply the tales of battles won or lost. Played from the first track to the last, it becomes a tapestry of voices telling their stories from myriad perspectives—farm boys going off to fight, slaves tracking out for the Underground Railroad, women who have to endure hardship and deprivation, and, finally, loss.

One of the best-sounding songs is "Horse Without a Rider," sung and co-written by Irene Kelley, with Jutz playing some nice guitar. A couple of other good ones are "Old Before Our Time," and "Eyes," which show precious sensitivity and empathy.

The 1861 Project is subtitled Volume 1, and presumably subsequent records will carry the tale to its inevitable end.

Hear This! "Horse Without A Rider" featuring Irene Kelley