The Hand That Burns the Cradle

Howdy, folks. You might already know me from up yonder at my own site, Big Rock Candy Mountain, if you'll pardon the self-promotion. Larry asked me if I'd be interested in doing the occasional post, and I was keen to take him up on the offer.

Those who are already familiar with my take on Country, Blues, Americana, whatnot, know I can be an opinionated bastard. Over the next few months I'm going to sprinkle in the occasional record and live show reviews with some of my thoughts on the current state of Country music. More specifically I thought I'd tug your coats on a couple of thoughts: Is "alt" or "insurgent" country actually just a rehash or logical extension of the dreaded Countrypolitan/Rhinestone Cowboy movement of the '70's? And, in a slightly similar vein: Can genuine Country music really be made in a urban setting? Those are loaded questions, rife with generalization and assumption permeating it's rhetoric, so bear with me 'til I make my case.

But, that's for later posts.

Today, I'd like to make a case for James Hand.

Of all the CD's and records I've collected over the past year, both new and old, Hand's album, "The Truth Will Set You Free" has stayed with me the longest, and has had the most profound effect on convincing me that Country has not completely fallen to marketing, gimmick, and genre selection. I could easily damn it by over thinking and over analysis. Truth is, it's a honky-tonk record, without the irony, and without the nudge and wink so common in Country, or Country-inspired records we seem overloaded with these days. Hand doesn't use the form or style of the accepted perception of Country to convey an idea that seems to fit with the style. He uses Country because he is country. A Texas native, a horse trainer, and a four decade veteran of playing honky-tonks, Hand has what some might call a pedigree. In simpler terms, he's paid his dues.

And you can hear those dues paid up on "The Truth Will Set You Free". Channeling the ghost of Hank, but never so coy as to try to be Hank, Hand forges the most unique identity in the canon that I've heard in years. His voice is a whiskey tinged, end of the night, lost the girl well of sadness, regret, and, hell, let's celebrate and do it all over again because it's who we are kind of voice that lingers over the smallest moment. The music is pure tonk, barebone, pedal steel loneliness, fiddle dancing, fish slapped snare. It's easily my album of the year, with nothing on the horizon that I think can beat it. We'll see.

All of that a preamble for one tune in particular on the album which should take it's place among the great southern gothic testimonials. On "Shadows Where the Magic Was", Hand tells the simplest of tales: A man visits the home he once shared with a woman who done him wrong. We don't know what she did to destroy him, but the loss is palpable. The man finds a bottle of whiskey he had hid "20 long years before." Naturally, he drinks it all down, and burns the building to the ground, himself inside. Simple, but it's how Hand presents the story that elevates the song.

Beginning, and continuing throughout, with a jaunty westen guitar line and chugging bass and drum line, the song is melodic and upbeat, musically, to the point of singalong. And sing along you will. Until you start listening to the lyrics. The song is infused with religious and supernatural imagery, demons roaring and hairs raising, the narrator haunted by something he can't articulate, and he is a captive to the inevitable, the doom looming. The proverbial gloaming hanging over the proceedings, a Southern conceit.

You picture the rusted gate, the linoleum floor, the cap to the whiskey bottle floating through thick space. Every image is palpable, but belied by the uptempo twang of the music.

The devil, the reigning second half of sin and salvation quandary of Country music,naturally makes an appearance. The final line of the chorus, and one of the finest lines written this year, is "who can tell what the devil does, when he walks on haunted ground." Once you hear the song, I dare you not to sing, lustily, out loud each time it hits that refrain.

But the devil is not the motivator, and here's where the tale turns. With a nod to the existentialism of Jimmie Dale Gilmore, and a quick handshake with Johnny Dowd, Hand finds his ghosts where he left them, and marks his own line in the burning sand (Repent!) with the final line of the song: "I don't give a damn what the devil does, cuz at last now I am free."

James Hand is the real deal, folks. A honky-tonker and a songwriter, an enduring voice when the pretenders to the crown have mercifully faded into pop memory. Unfortunately, and here's the enduring defeatist in me, Hand will probably fade into memory, lost to the marketing machines who can't find a proper slot for him. I don't think he fits into our ND world.

Thanks for stopping by.