Himmel und Hölle lagen im ländlichen Süden der USA eng beieinander. Geschunden von Armut und getrieben von Hoffnungslosigkeit glich das Leben der Leute, von denen Städter nur als ,white trash‘ sprachen, einer Achterbahnfahrt, hin und hergerissen zwischen Gewalt und Frömmigkeit nur die zwei Seiten der gleichen Medaille.
Hier finden wir Spuren wieder, die die zahlreichen Ur-kommunistischen, christlichen Einwanderergemeinschaften in der frühen amerikanischen Freiheitsgeschichte hinterlassen haben ihre hellen und dunklen Seiten. Wie das Leben, so die Lieder!
In den weißen Gospels und den Songs der Sünder aus den 20er und 30er Jahren begegnet uns das alte unheimliche Amerika in ganz unverstellter Form. Mörderballaden, Hillbilly Spirituals, Katastrophen Songs und dann wieder die reuevollen Gesänge aus der Gefängniszelle zwischen diesen Polen spannt sich das Repertoire der großen Sänger und Gruppen der frühen Countrymusik, denen Greil Marcus ein großes Buch widmete: ,Die europäischen Modernen versuchten alle extrem zu sein. Die großen Amerikaner waren einfach extrem.‘ Von Bob Dylan bis Kurt Cobain haben viele amerikanische Künstler aus diesem älteren Underground gelernt und gezehrt.
„Prayers From Hell… is a checklist of string bands (Byron Parker & His Mountaneers, The Dixon Brothers and white blues artists (Frank Hutchison) who felt the push and pull of a ’sinful‘ career in music versus sacred obligations. Dock Boggs experienced this opposition more deeply than most. His career trajectory saw him forsake coal mining for notoriety as a banjo player of freakish talent and a singer of scalding intensity. During the first wave of enthusiasm for his music, Boggs quit his career in 1930 at his wife’s insistence that he was being led down the wrong path. Interest in his work was stirred by the inclusion of tracks such as „Sugar Baby“ and „Count Blues“ on Smith’s Anthology, these and others (included here as well) led to Boggs’s return to performing three decades later, a welcomed presence at 60s folk festivals. Homebrewed musical physicists, The Monroe Brothers accelerated the quantum particles of the shape note hymns and square dance music on which they were raised. Bluegrass was the eventual result of their high-speed renditions of religious (I Am Ready To Go“) and secular material, though none of Bill Monroe’s later solo work would touch the feral verve o tracks such as these“ Wire, UK.
- 1. Carolina Ramblers String Band That Lonesome Valley 02:53
- 2. The Monroe Brothers I Am Ready to Go 02:44
- 3. The Carter Family The Church in the Wildwood 03:10
- 4. Dock Boggs New Prisoner's Song 02:52
- 5. The Dixon Brothers Didn't Hear Nobody Pray 03:41
- 6. Bill Carlisle The Heavenly Train 02:19
- 7. Frank Hutchison Hell Bound Train 02:59
- 8. Byron Parker & His Mountaineers We Shall Rise 02:40
- 9. Dock Boggs Down South Blues 03:06
- 10. Edith Collins; Sherman Collins What Will You Take in Exchange 03:04
- 11. Beatrice Dixon; Dorsey M. Dixon Shining City Over the River 02:24
- 12. Rodgers And Nicholson Worried Man Blues 02:59
- 13. The Carter Family It Is Better Farther On 02:59
- 14. Dock Boggs Country Blues 03:02
- 15. The Monroe Brothers What Would the Profit Be 02:28
- 16. Bill Carlisle's Kentucky Boys Unclouded Sky 02:40
- 17. Frank Hutchison Stackalee 03:04
- 18. The Dixon Brothers When Gabriel Blows His Trumpet for Me 02:59
- 19. Parker, Byron And His Mountaineers I Love My Savior 02:52
- 20. Dock Boggs Sugar Baby 02:56
- 21. Bill Carlisle He Will Be Your Savior Too 03:06
- 22. Ledford & Nicholson, Daniel Ninety Nine Years 02:59
- 23. Beatrice Dixon; Dorsey M. Dixon When Jesus Appears 03:07
- 24. Dock Boggs Pretty Polly 03:02
- 25. Edith Collins; Sherman Collins I Can't Feel at Home in the World Any More 02:43