Dave Carter with Tracy Grammer CD Review
Dave Carter with Tracy Grammer
When I Go
Signature Sounds SIG1272
****
Poetic, complex and played with a deftness few can match. The late Dave Carter and his then sidekick, and now a recording act in her own right Tracy Grammer, made music to die for!
Simple, stripped down and awash in folk and country roots, 2008 celebrates the 10th year celebration [and re-launch] of the duos classic recording and though, like with Emmylou Harris and Gram Parsons’ G.P and GREVIOUS ANGEL albums, the partnership was relatively short lived.
On listening to Carter and Grammer, I continually found myself flitting from one act to another as I mused over whom their music reminded me of. All good I hasten to add.
The sentimental childhood ditty plied with a familiar melody Annie’s Lover [warmed in guitar and fiddle] shuffle up alongside Grand Prairie TX Homesick Blues and a dashing, banjo/harmony vocals embraced The River, Where She Sleeps.
Listening to this album is like taking a slow train through America’s mid-west when simple was the way, and people knew little about anything other than shown in the pages of a Sears Roebuck catalogue.
He even brings a little western tale to the table in the way of Lancelot, where etched in mandolin and a gentle rhythm, Grammer and himself coerce out the lyrics.
Elvis Presley is a melancholy ballad where a landmark or two in American history gain mention with the reoccurring theme of ‘throw out the lifeline ‘cause somebody’s drifting away’ snared in fiddle and a soothing melody it slides by. Likewise, of a mellow even sombre tone, Kate And The Ghost Of Lost Love draws the listener ever closer to the duo’s music where, though Dave handles all the lead vocals on the album, this magical piece is the one exception.
Carter’s own banjo gains top billing on the beautifully sketched When I Go, where Carter and Grammer’s voices blend as one lending such support to one another’s work. Maurice Hope