Rattlin’ Bones - Kasey Chambers and Shane Nicholson
There’s a lot of variability in my music collection. Some of it is popular, some obscure. Some is vouched-for by those with genuine Good Taste, and some is scorned by those very ears. When I describe music as good, it is often with the disclaimer that this is only my opinion, sometimes shared by few. In the case of this album - the collaborative product of Kasey Chambers and Shane Nicholson - I can say with confidence that it is, objectively, one of the best albums I own. Listen to it.
I mean that even if you, as a rule, shun country music. This album is unmistakably country, but old-school country, and from where I stand seems to have more in common with folk rock than a lot of modern country music. It also has a lot of good stuff that transcendes genre distinctions and is just all-around good. Regardless of your preferred genres, listen.
As the title might suggest, the mood of the album is dark, but is contains enough contrasting lightness to accentuate that darkness. The lighter songs are down-to-earth and homey, and describe love, family, and home in simple and comforting terms. Sweetest Waste of Time and Once in a While are love songs that are satisfied with very little, being content with just brief, fleeting happiness. The House That Never Was reminds us that family trumps material wealth any day.
On the side of darkness, there are frequent references to Hell, the devil, and other elements of Christian mythology, and those images are used to great effect to describe the despondancy and despair that often permiates life. Monkey on a Wire is ominously catchy, and The Devil’s Inside My Head rings especially true to me as a sufferer of mental illness. I enjoy singing along with it at the top of my voice on the highway.
The album opens with the title track, Rattlin’ Bones, which has such intensely hellish and otherworldly imagery that it is almost a nightmare all on its own. When you listen to it, compare it with Your Day Will Come, near the end of the album. The two songs have much in common musically, although the similarities are masked by different vocal melodies. But the lyrical and instrumental themes are almost identical, to the point where I consider them to be versions of the same song - looking at the same subject from different angles.
Throughout the album are exciting instrumentation (guitars, banjos, fiddles) and beautiful vocal harmonies. Kasey Chambers and Shane Nicholson, along with the other musicians they brought together for this album, work very well together. I found out, while checking some facts online, that while I wasn’t paying attention they have produced another collaborative album, Wreck and Ruin. I am committed to not getting any new CDs until I am finished with this review projec, but I am sorely tempted to check this one out. It will have to wait, though. About a hundred more remain.
Next: Still Got Legs
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