hERE aND nOw (Peter Holsapple and Chris Stamey)

"hERE aND nOw" (Glenn Morrow’s Bar/None Records) is the first album released by Peter Holsapple and Chris Stamey since 1991. In terms of collaborations between the two, Stamey and Holsapple are best known for their work in the early 1980’s band, the dB's, an influential progenitor of Holsapple’s work with REM and Stamey’s more experimental solo work. The album has appearances from Branford Marsalis, local multi-band drummer Jon Wurster (Superchunk and many others), Logan Matheny (Roman Candle, The Rosebuds), Gary Greene (Hootie and the Blowfish, Big Head Todd and the Monsters), Greg Readling (Chatham County Line, Tift Merritt), and the dB's drummer and bassist, Gene Holder and Will Rigby.

The album’s opening track is a cover of Family’s “My Friend the Sun”. I will not claim to have been familiar with the original work, but it is of course accessible on-line for the uneducated like me. Family’s 1972 version features a methodical and percussive acoustic guitar, and a country twang that Gram Parsons must have appreciated. Holsapple and Stamey do not stray too far from the original, beautiful song, and it is a very fine fit for their vocal harmonies.

On “Santa Monica”, I wondered if Death Cab for Cutie singer Benjamin Gibbard listened to the dBs as a kid? The vocals of Death Cab are very reminiscent of Stamey’s solo vocals in Santa Monica. As other reviewers have noted, the guitars sound like Neil Young, Crazy Horse style. “Long Time Coming" has great work by Greg Readling; his pedal steel with Tift Merritt is missed. Lyrically, I usually do not care for songs that are “about the band”, which “Long Time Coming” leans toward, but it veers far enough into a redemptive, older but much wiser theme that it did not strike a blue note with me. In a related theme, “Here and Now” is somewhat “about the band”, but seems to be reflecting on the importance of getting the song right and having their audience appreciate that fact. Maybe this is a wider metaphor for a mature recognition of life’s limited opportunities for carpe diem?
“Early in the Morning” features Branford Marsalis on saxophone, playing a descending melody line that complements the guitar licks and vocal melody. The melody is simple, mellow, and evocative of the “Like a diamond in the sky” melody of “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star (or the melody of “H, I, J, K, elemen OP”); is this intentionally to contrast to the somewhat mature lyrics about an early morning delight with a lady who is now taking a post-coital nap?
“Song for Johnny Cash” again has a very tasteful dose of always mournful pedal steel and lead guitar, and borders on deifying the Man in Black (“when I’m lost, you make me believe”). That’s about right in my world.
Long and short, this is a great album. Let’s hope that it’s not another 18 years until the next Stamey and Holsapple collaboration.

-Ted Murphy