Coming Home

The Grammy Award for Best Bluegrass Album went to The O'Connor Band for their collection, Coming Home. My first few listens I thought the record was about as exciting as the title, which meant not much. But the more times I played the more I came to appreciate the best part of it--the voice of Kate Lee.

The band is a family--Mark is the father, a long-celebrated bluegrass musician, his son Forrest is on mandolin, his wife (by her youthful appearance she looks not to be his first) Maggie is on violin. Lee is married to Forrest, and she's the one that makes the band interesting. I mean, Mark O'Connor is a virtuoso on the fiddle, but when I hear her sing I just melt (it doesn't hurt that she's one of the most beautiful women I've ever seen).

The record has three different types of songs. Forrest's songs are the least interesting--bland and forgettable. Mark O'Connor highlights the instrumentals, such as the kick-ass version of Bill Monroe's "Jerusalem Ridge," another called "Fishers Hornpipe," and an elegiac piece, "Fiddler Going Home," which seems to be an attempt at reproducing the poignancy of "Ashokan Farewell."

Then there's the Lee songs, which she co-wrote. "Blacktop Boy" is very strong, with a fine lyric:

"Dressed to kill with a black shirt on
and a cool guitar
like Johnny Cash had crashed to Earth
from a fallen star."

Another, called "Old Black Creek" sounds as if it was written a hundred years ago and Lee's vocals are so mysterious and arresting that you get drawn into it. And the best thing on the album is her rendition of an old song called "Ruby, Are You Mad at Your Man?" The video of a performance can be found here. She can sure hold a note, and her charisma and appearance could make her a big star if she broke out of the bluegrass niche.