Fists of Violets

Record store categories are disappearing along with the retail stores that made use of them. And that may in some ways be a relief to performers such as Sarah Alden, whose path of musical development took her from classical to bluegrass and then to Balkan sounds. Now residing in New York, she founded the ‘Balkan punk collective’ Luminescent Orchestrii, and a couple of its musicians join her here, alongside others from the like-minded Veveritse Brass Band and the Brazilian-American fusion group Nation Beat. They form the cast for a sort of recorded variety show. Alden’s voice, though not polished or powerful, works well and amusingly on both old-time numbers like ‘Ruby, Honey are You Mad at Your Man?’ and such early American music hall chestnuts as ‘Come Take a Trip on my Airship’ and ‘Willie the Weeper’. Alden’s originals and arrangements are sometimes overproduced and melodically and harmonically limited. But the Serbian instrumental ‘Niz Banju Idem’ stands apart from the album’s other all-American material and is thoroughly charming.