Charlie Louvin
Sings Murder Ballads and Disaster Songs
Rating: 2.5
Label: Tompkins Square
The murder ballad has always been an essential part of folk music. Though many see it as American through and through, the murder ballad had its origins in Europe; human beings are inherently voyeurs and the murder ballad satisfies our salacious desire for blood and retribution. Killers almost always meet some sort of justice or are haunted by the dead for eternity. With the popularity of Harry Smith's Anthology of American Music and Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds's aptly titled Murder Ballads, this age old form has been given new life.
Country legend Charlie Louvin takes a crack at these dreadful tales on his latest release, Sings Murder Ballads and Disaster Songs. Though Louvin has been a popular artist since the '50s (half of the famed Louvin Brothers), it took his eponymous 2007 album for Tompkins Square, which featured duets with Jeff Tweedy and Elvis Costello, to bring the singer to the indie consciousness. Following stints at festivals such as Bonnaroo, Louvin, like Loretta Lynn, began to enjoy a new audience.
Last year, Tompkins Square released People Take Warning! Murder Ballads & Disaster Songs, 1913-1938, a project that included artists such as Son House and Charley Patton. Capitalizing on the resurgence of the murder ballad, Louvin chose some songs from People Take Warning! to create Sings.
Anyone familiar with Louvin lore will know that Charlie's brother Ira was killed in 1965 in a car accident. Plagued by addiction his entire life, Ira had just begun to sober up when struck by a drunk driver in Missouri. Charlie has said, in numerous interviews, that he has never fully recovered from the loss of his brother. Sings allows Louvin the opportunity to revisit songs he sang with Ira, such as "Katy Dear" and "Mary of the Wild Moor." But the ghost of Ira lingers nowhere more than on "Wreck on the Highway," a story of death on an empty, lonely road.
The biggest draw on Sings is the history residing in Louvin's 81-year-old voice. It is has a worn-in sound, the decades unfurling with each note. Unfortunately, Louvin is not enough to save this album entirely. While tracks such as "Down With the Old Canoe" chronicle the sinking of the Titanic with tender humor, there is not enough menace within that one would expect on an old album about untimely death. An air of peril and danger hangs over Cave's ballads that Louvin chooses not to employ on this album of mostly mid-tempo waltzes. Murder ballads should chill, rather than console.
For the casual fan, Sings Murder Ballads and Disaster Songs probably warrants a pass. Listening to Son House and Charley Patton sing these tunes is both historically and sonically more interesting. For those who are hardcore Louvin fans, this album is merely a serviceable and somewhat interesting chapter in his canon.
by David Harris
[Illustration: Sarah Goodreau]