“Soulgrass,” that’s the name Paula Boggs has given to the music she and her band make. And although genre labels are often odd and arbitrary affairs, I reckon, as tags go, it’s perfect. After all, who but the least imaginative or most pedantic person wouldn’t read that delicious compound word and not already have an idea of what to expect?
And although the titular opener might not immediately head down such a route, being more of an acoustic, singer-songwriter sort of sound, albeit one adorned with choral voices, brooding cello, and drifting electric guitars, we are slowly drawn into this world where soul seduction meets folk finesse.
By the time we get to “Still Grateful,” there is no question that the label isn’t well chosen, being a heady arrangement of picked strings and serene violin, but chiming with all the charm and sonic charisma of the most seductive soul ballad. “Note to Quinn” flutters along on a poignantly picked banjo, “Traces of You” feels like the soundtrack to a drama playing out in a Parisian cafe in the twenties, and “Airline Boogie” mixes modern travel tales with traditional back porch sonics.
The album signs off with the most wonderfully old-time-sounding slice of rootsy, soulful, bluesy, raggle-taggle-jazz, bar-room groove on the whole album. Calling on the sonic services of such stalwarts as Blind Boys of Alabama and Valerie June, together they deliver a fantastic new take on the defiant civil rights anthem, “Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me ‘round.” Timeless and yet, sadly, timely.
Even as a reviewer, I have tried hard to categorize the music, that’s sort of my job, but really, you could just say that this is just roots music at its finest. You could, if you want to get to the music’s essence, even go as far as say, it is merely folk music, after all, as none other than Louis Armstrong himself observed, “All music is folk music. I ain’t never heard a horse sing a song.”
Well quite!
