When I received a copy of The Road Crew’s “Songs from the Mother Road,” I was startled to see a positive review from country star Marty Stuart on the CD package. Having followed Stuart’s career for at least 20 years, his endorsement heightened my anticipation of hearing the album.
However, I have to conclude that Stuart was trying to be a nice guy. “Songs from
the Mother Road” is a competently recorded country album, but the singing and songwriting proved disappointing. It may be a pleasant listen for some, but it doesn’t adequately convey the rich history and colorful characters of our favorite road.
The album was released by Readio Theatre, which primarily produces audiobooks. Nearly all the music was written by Woody Bomar, and performed by former CBS recording artist Don King and The Road Crew band in a Nashville, Tenn., studio.
A few songs show promise. “Dust” conveys the dread and hope seen during Okies’ migration from the Dust Bowl to California. “The Railroad is Coming to Town” is a snapshot of a small town in the pre-Route 66 era. An instrumental, “The Sun on 66,” with its reverb-drenched guitar, sounds like a surf classic from the Ventures.
But much of Bomar’s songwriting is weak. “By the Side of the Road” and “The Motherland, OK” sound more like a laundry list of Route 66 attractions and towns than songs. Songs about Mother Road icons such as “Chain of Rocks Park,” “Tucumcari Tonite” and “The Old Way” (which is about “Guardian Angel of 66” Angel Delgadillo) brim with unfulfilled potential.
A strong singer might have sold some of this material. But King, who at least brings an affable presence to album, doesn’t have the voice to make many of these songs compelling.
I hoped to like this album more. But Readio has an promising-sounding Route 66 children’s book coming out this spring, so I’m looking forward to that.
In the meantime, perhaps someone will eventually record a definitive Route 66 album. Maybe it will be Jay Farrar, who has alluded to the Mother Road with his band, Son Volt, and on solo albums. Maybe it will be Melissa McClelland, who wrote songs during her Route 66 journey last summer. Or maybe it will be Stuart, who recorded an impressive CD about the saga of the American Indian a few years ago and isn’t shy about concept albums.
Thank you for your well written comments about “Songs From The Mother Road.” It certainly was kind of you to take your time to give this album your attention. However, I know that Marty Stuart does not review many products and certainly had no reason to be “a nice guy” when writing his positive review for this album.
Woody Bomar (hit songwriter) never intended for this album to convey the “history” of The Mother Road, but rather to convey a feeling, the spirit of the highway and to create more interests in current and future travelers. Woody and I are a couple of vietnam vets who find it inspiring to travel route 66 and find ourselves in another place and time, when Route 66 was in its hey-day, and hope to share that feeling with others through our music.
I hope your subscribers will want to find out for themselves why this album is so popular with iTunes and many of the museums and giftshops along Route 66.
Seriously, thank you for your review. Thank you for bringing important events and issues to the attention of all those who love the road.
Respectfully yours – Joe
Obviously Marty got more mileage out his listening experience than I did. Perhaps I should have ended the review by saying, “Your mileage may vary.” 😉
Having been a music fan for virtually all my adult life, I understand how difficult it is to create compelling music. I’m thrilled when I hear an effective Route 66-theme song like Son Volt’s “Ten Second News,” Wayne Hancock’s “Thunderstorms and Neon Signs” and Melissa McClelland singing “Skyway Bridge” on the Old Chain of Rocks Bridge. But it takes more than a connection to the Mother Road to get that feeling. It takes soul, talent, musicianship and hooks. “Songs from the Mother Road” has some of those aspects, but not enough of them, in my opinion.
Anyway, thanks for being a good sport. And I’m looking forward to reading that children’s book.
Blog
The Brycian Chronicles
bryce_martin_1@Lycos.com
Hell’s Half-Acre
by Bryce Martin
An acid, metallic aroma from Hell filled the air many a day in Galena, Kan. That would change some depending on exactly where I pedaled on a long bike-ride day. The odor flaring my nostrils came from the stacks of the Eagle-Picher lead smelter in billows powerful enough in bulk to reach several miles, depending on the wind stream and other conditions. In East Galena, you had to be fairly close, within a few blocks, to whiff the air bouquet from the Old Rock Distillery.
Route 66 went right by the Eagle-Picher plant, exposing it to America’s traffic mainstream. Hell’s Half-Acre was what the area was called immediate to the plant in a radius of a mile or so in any direction, but mostly next to and across Route 66 from the smelter. The earth was polluted from the pollutants sailing and settling from the plant’s emission stacks, those huge pipes pointing upwards. It illustrated blight the way a patch of mange on a dog illustrated disease.
Smelting is what goes on inside a lead smelter. Since the ore known as galena is lead sulphide (think sulfur), the ore is literally roasted to remove the sulfur. The sulfurous fumes and particulates as excess are belched into the atmosphere from the plant’s infernal belly.
I was struck at a young age by the phrase “Hell’s Half-Acre” as a description for the area. How could any name be more apt and more colorful at the same time?
“How long has it been called that?” I asked. That was a question posed in the early 1950s and the reply was that it had been called that for decades past.
The plant was still operating in those early 1950s, though nothing near its output in peak or even moderate years in the past. Other Eagle-Picher lead smelters existed in the region. Big ones in Miami, Okla., and in Joplin, Mo. But the one with its picture in my grade school textbook, describing it as “the world’s largest lead smelter” was this one, the one that had created Hell’s Half-Acre, which had no picture or mention in the textbook. The picture was significant in that the textbook was not about Galena, not about its County, Cherokee, and not even about Kansas. It was a history book. To have that one mention about Galena in an entire book filled with chapters with text, pictures and illustrations on glossy paper about so many varied places and things, I swelled with pride. I was glad they left out the Hell’s Half-Acre part.
-30-