Folk Singer Vol 1

So-called ‘folk revivals’ come and go as regularly as the seasons, for this is music that never dies or fades. Even Hollywood can’t ignore its timeless potency: this time around it's the Coen Brothers’ Inside Llewyn Davis, and the debut solo album by Willie Watson, formerly of Old Crow Medicine Show, could not come at a more opportune moment. Produced in Nashville by Dave Rawlings, it's a solo album in the truest sense – Watson's keening, high-and-lonesome voice is accompanied only by his sparse acoustic guitar, banjo and occasional harmonica as he attempts to recreate the old-time, rustic mood of Harry Smith's Anthology of American Folk Music without the hiss and crackle. The repertoire is of the same vintage, too – songs by Lead Belly, Uncle Dave Macon, Roscoe Holcomb, Memphis Slim and Gus Cannon are sung compellingly in a voice pitched somewhere between the sly wit of Loudon Wainwright, David Gray's contemporary folk-pop, and a million anonymous old-timers of Appalachian back-porch legend. Lovely stuff.