If you're looking for a musical trip down memory lane, you're in the wrong CD.
While the majority of these John Stewart songs were recorded by the Kingston Trio nearly three decades ago, they are brand new. And despite John's exhortation to "return with us now to those thrilling days of yesteryear," I really think it's the other way around.
These songs have caught up with us, reborn with a new sound and interpretation that make them as relevant to our ears today as they were the first time out. That's no simple feat considering the power of the original performances and the fact that many Trio fans consider them KT standards.
It is fitting, too, that many of the songs included in this compilation feature duets or background vocals with Nick Reynolds, John's musical partner in the Trio and long time friend. Seven cuts, in fact, were originally released as a Reynolds-Stewart duo album in 1983 entitled REVENGE OF THE BUDGIE.
"Nick Reynolds was clearly the best entertainer in the Trio and one of the best natural musicians I have ever worked with," John once recounted to me for a Frets article. "Singing with Nick again on the BUDGIE project made me remember just how much fun singing can be; it was really the most fun I've had singing since leaving the Trio."
Today, to the delight of audiences worldwide, Nick Reynolds is again a member of the Kingston Trio. Sounds better than ever, too, I might add.
There is more here though than just new interpretations. Recorded in 1983 and 1986, these cuts represent the culmination of everything that John Stewart had assimilated musically and technically in the years since he'd left the Trio. It is his show totally - writer, producer, engineer, performer, proud parent. And while recording technology has leapfrogged in the past several years, I still regard this collection as the quintessential studio album with Stewart using the board like a giant painter's palette. If you doubt the ability of a micro-chip to move you emotionally, just listen to Those Who Are Wise or Run The Ridges and you'll know otherwise.
Beyond music and technique and artistic growth, I think these tunes, ultimately, make a personal statement in a way that no other collection of John Stewart work could. By revisiting songs that he wrote and performed with the Kingston Trio, Stewart has graciously tipped his hat to millions of Trio fans who will forever remember him as a member of their favorite group and a source of some of the Trio's finest songs.
But by performing them with such new power, personal feeling and pure instinct, he has also let us know that these aren't really Kingston Trio songs at all. They're John Stewart songs.
And it's time you knew the difference.
- Bill Bush
(Bill Bush is a music journalist whose articles have appeared in Guitar Player, Frets and Artists Of American Folk Music.)
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Chilly Winds (1993) - 