The voice of Americana, Jim Lauderdale, has explored bluegrass, roots music, several albums with Robert Hunter, and pure country over the course of 37 records. From the opening notes of Tommy Detamore’s pedal steel on the opening title track, we know immediately which vein he’s in on “My Favorite Place.” This is as pure as country gets.
Lauderdale has developed a fruitful partnership with producer Jay Weaver, who again produces this album on Lauderdale’s Skycrunch label. Lauderdale wrote eight of these eleven himself, the others with various co-writers. In fact, this is quite a comprehensive project, as no two tracks have the same musicians. Weaver on bass and guitarist Craig Smith from Lauderdale’s touring band, The Game Changers, are the two constants. Given Lauderdale’s luminous status in Nashville, he can call on some of the best and, along with Detamore, recognizable names to most, include keyboardist Micah Hulscher, pedal steel player Steve Hinson, guitarists Chris Scruggs and Kenny Vaughan, and others from his road band, drummer Dave Racine, and harmony vocalist Lillie Mae and Frank Rische.
In some respects, the sound here doesn’t differ much from Lauderdale’s first major label albums when he was based in southern California, such as 1991’s Planet of Love, 1994’s Pretty Close to the Truth, and 1995’s Every Second Counts. Yet, it is fair to say that his four-plus decades of different brands of country and roots music have formed a distinct Jim Lauderdale sound. Few write and sing as well as Lauderdale, and aside from his Americana label, here he is more accurately a torch bearer for the traditional country sound of pedal steel, fiddle, and twangy telecasters. Listen for those special touches such as Catherine Styron Marks’ piano on the title track. (“Anywhere I’m with you is my favorite place.”) This could be straight out of the Golden Era of country music. “Mrs. Green” takes it down to a mid-tempo ballad, developing the storyline by first urging her to see the truth of who she is, conveying later that he rescues her from the doomed relationship she’s trapped in.
He delivers beautiful metaphors and mythology in the balladic love story “The Lightning Tree,” co-written with the legendary Cowboy Jack Clement, imbued by tasting acoustic picking from Smith. Hinson’s pedal steel introduces the crooning country weeper “You’ll Be Gone Again,” one of the strongest vocal tracks, along with the bluesy “Baby Steps.” (“I’m taking baby steps instead of crawling”) The rollicking piano/rapid-picked “Sweethearts Remember” and the honky tonk “Don’t You Treat Em That Way” features exceptional instrumental backing and the harmonies of bandmate Lillie Mae Rische. “I’m a Lucky Loser” is another single, straight-ahead country with the twin twangy guitars of Marty Stuart’s Fabulous Superlatives’ Kenny Vaughan and Chris Scruggs.
Two uplifting tunes, “We Ought to Celebrate” and “You’ve Got to Shine,” precede the clever wordplay of the acoustic, uncannily philosophical closer “What’s Important After All” (“Can’t make a cake without the batter/Can’t paint the house without a ladder”), ultimately reminding us to enjoy life in the moment. Lauderdale enjoys making records as much as any artist we’ve heard in these past four decades. It’s nearly impossible to compare this to his voluminous output of so many terrific records, but this is as well-crafted and well-conceived as any of them. He shuns his tendency to be a bit experimental in favor of the pure stuff that suits him best.
