American experience

Tom Russell's the man from God Knows Where

by John O'Neill

Throughout a 20-year career that has included stints backing up strippers at skid-row bars and driving a hack in New York City (and a mid-'80s renaissance that catapulted him from super-unknown to just under-appreciated), Tom Russell has never quite found a rightful place in the scheme of the music industry.

"I don't really fit in," agrees Russell from his home in West Texas. Fresh off a tour of Holland and Norway, he chats while catching up on his mail. "I was never part of that Austin scene or the scene in LA. I don't fit country or folk. I guess I kinda fit into `Americana,' that corral they stick those who don't fit country!"

Too smart for commercial country, too well-rounded for the puritanical element of traditional folk, and too busy working on the next song to be bothered about large-scale success, Russell has existed as a critical darling and the envy of his contemporaries. Joe Ely, Dave Alvin, Johnny Cash, Nanci Griffith, even the Boss himself represent a handful of already-stellar songwriters that has covered his work. That's because Russell's generally amazing songs cross many boundaries, just as he himself won't settle to be compartmentalized by the industry. Horse thieves, out-of-work steel workers, prison lifers, the downfall of Bill Haley, and a fighting rooster from Mexico have all been topics that receive inventive novel-like treatment.

Drinking to remember in Barcelona, wandering the Rio Grande, looking for lost love in Lyon, France: intricate plot, context, mood, and character are imbued upon his less-than-beautiful world of restless sinners and unintentional saints. It's a trait that has consistently marked his recent work.

"I was educated as a criminologist for a while, so that's the street factor," Russell says of his writing style. "I always wanted to be a novelist and I think that -- along with growing up listening to cowboy ballads -- helps round out the craft. That and a lot of dues paying."

And those dues have paid-off immeasurably with his most recent release, The Man from God Knows Where (Hightone), Russell's masterstroke, and one of the most ambitious albums ever committed to tape. Essentially a 74-minute folk-opera, God Knows Where is a 26-song oratory that traces the European immigration explosion to America, specifically through the voices of Russell's Irish and Norwegian ancestors. The result is more than just an unsettling chronicle of the settling of the so-called promised land, it is also very much a history of music. Marrying country-folk to the indigenous music of the old homeland -- hardangar fiddle, Swedish nyckelharps, uillean pipes, tin whistle -- Russell is able to transport us across the ocean, through the gates of Ellis Island, and onto the vast expanse of the American landscape.

"I started with the idea six or seven years ago as a long epic poem -- this exotic idea of a tonal piece about America," explains Russell, whose concept was fueled by reading both his great-grandfathers' diaries. "[The more I researched] the more my ancestors' voices started filtering through the piece until they became part of it. I read between the lines for some of it. When my father died two years ago, it came full-circle."

Russell's tale is of the 19th- and early-20th-century outcasts and how they lived their lives. Hard times, hard work, heartbreak, castigation, suffering, loss, perseverance -- these are elements that were at the core of the American Experience, and the vital foundation on which the country grew. Russell is able to capture all this in vivid detail, both through his stunning lyrics and by using a stellar cast of musicians to give the album a cohesive feel. Iris DeMent, with a voice that sounds like it's coming from an open screen door somewhere in the Midwest, is heart-rending on "Acres of Corn," a look back at life unfulfilled ("But dreams are just things, you keep in a trunk/Till the men are out workin', or you've gone a bit drunk/Then you unlock your dreams, but they're tattered and torn/So you stare out the windows, at the acres of corn"). Dave Van Ronk turns in a Tom Waits-style, so-true-it's-funny spin as "The Outcaste." Dolores Keane, one of Ireland's greatest folk singers, is the voice of Mary Clare Malloy, and native Norwegians Keri Bremnes (as Anna Olson) and Sondre Bratland (Ambrose Larson) offer a couple that never fully assimilate to life in the new land. The international all-star cast help to bring a real sentimentality to Russell's words.

"I had a wish list; and we went to Norway to do the album, and it worked out well," says Russell of putting together the ensemble. "I think the [album] is helped by the different voices. It took a while to get it together."

The high point of God Knows Where comes with the closing numbers. On "Throwing Horseshoes at the Moon," Russell wrestles with the legacy of his father and the recollections of his childhood. It hits hard, as all truths do, then gives way to the hopeful "Love Abides" that neatly ties the album together.

The Man from God Knows Where is to folk music as Pet Sounds was to pop in 1966. Unlike anything before it, it's a rare, benchmark moment that other artists will be forced to strive for. And Russell makes a case for himself as the contemporary equal of Woody Guthrie.

Perhaps the most important point of the album is forgotten history, and not just the trashing of the glossed-over mythical America. Russell, through the use of traditional instrumentation, underscores the point that modern Americans, bent on consumerism, technological advance, and multiculralism, have lost an important aspect of ourselves -- our roots.

Local Buzz

The secret society of Worcester/ Allston known only to us mortals as Garrison have finished up their debut EP for Revelation Records. And it should be available for your purchasing pleasure in June. Then the boys hope to get a little touring in. The much-beleaguered Walshy's On Main has been ordered closed by the city's License Commission. Congrats to Clutch Grabwell trombonist and all-around swell guy Lennie Peterson, who, along with his significant other, Ginger, celebrate the release of his new book, The Big Picture. In related news, Clutch's new CD, How You Gonna Be, has been picked up for national distro. The Worcester Phoenix Best Music Poll is rounding third and heading for home, so remember to get your ballot in ASAP. You'd be amazed at how close some of these categories finish, so, if your favorites lose by one vote (and it has happened) your conscience will be clear.