Album: Charlie Parr, Barnswallow (Tin Angel)

4.00

Nick Coleman

Saturday 27 April 2013

It could only come from Duluth. Iron-hard banjo, guitar, washboard, footstomp and harmonica, plus voice – American roots hoicked out of the ground but not hosed down.

There are eight originals on Barnswallow and two covers. But each is as authentic as the next, music reputedly absorbed in a TV-less household enlightened only with records by Charlie Patton, Leadbelly, and Lightnin' Hopkins. Caustic, funky and unadorned. A real beggar's banquet.

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