Hummin’ Bird Records

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As I played this new, all-original album from Grey DeLisle, it seemed as if the clocks had been turned back some sixty-odd years to the mid-1960s, when I eagerly opened a package of LPs that I’d bought from Jimmie Skinner’s Music Center in Cincinnati. I’d had to wait patiently for eight weeks for hard-to-get music to be shipped to jolly old England. That was the way it was for us passionate UK country music fans in those far-off days. The beauty of the great classic country records of bygone days was not to be confused with perfection. If you corrected the mistakes on your favorite records of the past, they wouldn’t have the charm that they have. Country music is about capturing a feeling and not overthinking it. Grey DeLisle and her band of musicians understand that a search for the organic exists at the heart of the country music’s lyrical idiom; a vocabulary of narratives meant to conjure imagery. It takes a special skill set to master the sound of classic country music—one that not many musicians have. There are certain nuances to the playing, performing, and singing that are hard to develop if you don’t steep yourself in the traditional sounds and styles of country’s rich legacy. Grey’s own music is firmly rooted in her beloved old school country, with influences from Kitty Wells, Loretta Lynn, Jean Shepard, Patsy Cline and Tammy Wynette. This 14-song set is a powerful, personal act of ‘musical time travel,’ running the gamut from uncomfortably intimate dispatches of an anguished heart to toe-tapping western swing tunes and even a tongue-in-cheek duet, all of which finds her reliable voice of common sense in peak form.

The arrangement of I Like The Way You Think I Think, with its likeable string of pick-up lines, beams with vintage acoustic and electric guitar, pedal steel and fiddle, spotlighting the instrumental performances by the crack studio band comprising co-producers Deke Dickerson and Eddie Clendening along with DJ Bonebrake, Dave Biller, Carl Sonny Leland, T. Jarrod Conta, Mike Molnar, Jonny Bowler, Tammy Rogers and others. The talked/sung cadence of The Dog, a magical duet between Grey and Asleep At The Wheel’s Ray Benson—both of whom know their way around classic country tunes—recalls those humorous duet exchanges of Porter & Dolly and Conway & Loretta. Grey’s soft, scratchy vocal tone is the ideal companion to Ray’s deep bass tones in this solemn break-up tune in which their dog could be the one flaw in their separation, culminating in a comedic give-and-take exchange at the close

A masterclass in wry wit and thoughtful, inspired songwriting; I Missed Me is the ultimate example, with the dire warning to her cheating husband: ‘Damn I missed you, but my aim is improving,’ all to a toe-tapping country rhythm. Piercing heartbreakers like Stick And Poke, with Tammy Rogers mournful fiddle and the steel-driven Wasted, aim to ease the pain they catalogue by moving on to hopefully something better, tracing a nonlinear path for others to follow. In contrast, the funky Big Sister, sounds like a long-lost 1960s r&b floor-filler, to demonstrate the sheer versatility of Grey DeLisle and her skilled musicians. This is one of her most wonderful and varied sounding records—and considering the impeccable standard of what’s come before, that’s a real accomplishment.

www.greydelislegriffin.com

December 2023