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How
does an established and preeminent acoustic artist like Vance
Gilbert follow up his feted cover album Angels, Castles, Covers
(2006) and his songwriting watermark Unfamiliar Moon (2005)?
With Up On Rockfield, that's how!
Up On Rockfield finds Gilbert exploring and unabashedly celebrating
the influence various famous songwriters and performers have had
upon his writing. Each song is penned by Gilbert as if he was
co-writing with some of his musical heroes. Who else but him could
pull off a concept project such as this and have both press and
radio giddy with anticipation?
"Up on Rockfield", the opening title track is a soulful call-to-arms
of a small community, reminiscent of mid-70's Van Morrison. Then
comes the rollicking country rock of "Welcome to Lovetown", joyously
sounding like John Hiatt
enlisting a hand from Prince. And there is the innocent and wise
"Goodbye Pluto", written, says Gilbert, "as if Shawn Colvin and
Raffi were to write together."
The lyrical sensibility and jazz quartet approach of Tom Waits is
reflected in "Old Man's Advice", while the sparsely instrumented
meditation "Judge's House" was written after a spate of listening to
Steve Earle and Bruce Springsteen, and could readily be in the
company of any of the tunes on the latter's Nebraska. "Whatever
Louise Wants" is a take on what it would be like "if Richard
Thompson was to write a song about my dog..", while banjo and funk
become stable mates in the story that is "Sweetwater", sounding as
if Al Jarreau and Lynyrd Skynyrd were snowbound at a hotel together
and decided to jam.
The lonesome "It'll Never Be Enough" is destined to be some great
country singer's quintessential album-ender, while "House Of Prayer"
is an actual cowrite between Vance and long-time friend Lori
McKenna. "Some Great Thing" is Vance's nod to the Gospel stylings of
Thomas A. Dorsey, and could easily be part of any religion's hymnal.
The album ends with the solo and aching "Sing Me Down", a subtle yet
scathing environmental policy indictment that leaves the listener
wondering if Bob Dylan was at the other end of the pen.
Vance Gilbert burst onto the singer/songwriter scene in the early
90's when buzz started spreading in the folk clubs of Boston about
an ex-multicultural arts teacher who was knocking 'em dead at open
mics. Once word got to New York about this Philadelphia-area born
and raised performer, Shawn Colvin invited Gilbert to be a special
guest on her Fat City tour. Gilbert took audiences across the
country by storm. "With the voice of an angel, the wit of a devil,
and the guitar playing of a god, it was enough to earn him that
rarity: an encore for an opener"
wrote the Fort Worth Star-Telegram in its review of a show from that
tour. Gilbert's three albums for the Rounder/Philo label - Edgewise
(1994), Fugitives (1995), and the celebrated, arrestingly sparse
Shaking Off Gravity (1998) - are all essential additions to the
American singer-songwriter collection. With guests as
varied as Tuck and Patti, Jonatha Brooke, Patty Larkin, Vinx, and
Jane Siberry, all three albums found significant niches on NAC (New
Adult Contemporary) and Non-Commercial A3 (Adult Album Alternative)
radio.
These discs were followed by the self-released Somerville Live
(2000), lionized by the Boston Globe as the
disc "young songwriters should study the way law students cram for
bar exams," and One Thru Fourteen (2002), a stylistically varied
offering that New York's Town and Village called "lively, eclectic,
electrifying and transcending." Gilbert followed with Side Of The
Road (2003), a duo album with Ellis Paul, lauded as "haunting,
artful, and lovely" by Boston Magazine and nominated for a 2004
Boston Music Award. Unfamiliar Moon (2005) came as an impressive
continuation to this mostly original composition discography. "The
songwriter's
most compelling work; literate, heartfelt, rippling…emotionally
resonant songs" raved the Boston Globe, placing the album in its'
Top 10 CDs of the year (#4). On Angels, Castles, Covers, "Gilbert's
choice of an album of covers seems both fitting and fearless. …he
displays his vocal virtuosity with some unexpected choices from the
late 20th century songbook. From the sounds of Motown, through the
R&B of Al Green to classic Joni Mitchell and Shawn Colvin…He makes
each and every tune sound fresh and new." writes Roberta Schwartz of
FAME.
Finishing a year and a half as support for George Carlin is the most
recent chapter in Gilbert's varied and successful performance
history, leading up to the creation and recording of Up On Rockfield.
Up On Rockfield is indeed Vance Gilbert's career-crowning
achievement. This tour de force of borrowed styles is classic Vance
Gilbert original songwriting at its most timeless, compelling best.
Gilbert unflinchingly renders blame and
absolution, trapped hearts and free-riders, class and station,
uncertainty and resolution, the spiritual and the visceral, the
forever and the now, all side by side in song. His is a presentation
steeped in deep humanism and bravery, stunning artistry and soul,
and unbridled joy. No great surprise to the learned acoustic
listener.
This is Vance Gilbert, after all.
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