Out this coming week! Billy Bragg and Joe Henry have recorded what you can expect to be an award winning Americana album ‘Shine A Light’.
Here’s the poop! In March 2016 Billy and Henry, (who produced Billy’s last album ‘Tooth & Nail’ and who has produced Solomon Burke, Aaron Neville, Bonnie Rait and others) guitars in hand, boarded a Los Angeles bound train at Chicago’s Union Station looking to reconnect with the culture of American railroad travel and the music it inspired.
Winding along 2,728 miles of track over four days, the latter day Woody Guthrie’s recorded classic American railroad songs such as Lead Belly’s ‘Midnight Special’, the Memphis Jug Band’s ‘KC Moan’,Hank Williams’ ‘Lonesome Whistle’ and Woody’s ‘Hobo’s Lullaby’ in waiting rooms and at trackside while the train paused to pick up passengers in stops such as El Paso, Fort Worth, Pine Bluff, St. Louis and onto Chicago Grand Union Station.
These are great field recordings and the set is well worth checking out.
Read the review in The Guardian by clicking here.