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Issue
#88
Aug. '06
I have an advantage, or
perhaps even a disadvantage – the new CD, the
river and the sea, by Chris Buskey
and the High Lonesome Plains,
contains 12 tracks of pure Alt. Country / Americana rock bliss
– Yet 8 of those
tracks have been in my collection for quite some time and while this
gives me greater
insight, it also draws me back to a review I wrote in May of 2002 for
the High Lonesome Plains EP, Songs for Young Lovers.
In Issue #37 of the IMC
‘Zine I wrote: “Pain,
heartache, sorrow, self-pity, The Lonesome
Loser, a wreck of a man whose self confidence has been shattered and
scattered by too many
lovers who have passed through his life without any hope of return.
Sure he’s loved
them; he’s loved them with such uncompromising reverence that
he cannot see past his
own blindness to the issues that play heavy in his heart and mind.”
That statement holds
forth for the river and the sea, but
gone is the blindness – by surrounding 3 of the 4 songs found
on the 2002 EP (Brass
Ring
(Nothing Lasts), God and Texas, Porch Light)
with 9 more tales of heartache and heartbreak, we hear and experience a
growth, an
acceptance, a maturity if you will, of both the heart and mind of our
protagonist. Even as
we feel his pain and despair of lost/unrequited/longed for love(s), we
realize our
lonesome loser is going to be fine – “First
the river / then the sea.”
Shortly after the
release of
the 2002 EP, an Australian Record company
with great interest (and international distribution) contacted Chris Buskey about releasing a
full-length CD.
Plans were made, the CD was recorded, and the Australian Record Co.
went silent in regards
to the High Lonesome Plains
– while they
obviously continued with business as usual, no correspondence was
returned, ever.
Meanwhile, Chris circulated a 2 song single (40 Acres, Amber),
and a 4 song EP (containing the single 40 Acres, along with Despise,
Down
To
Nothing, and Take Your Time) while biding
his time. Finally,
after a year plus of waiting, and with the help of Vic Steffens
(who’s production
caps this CD perfectly) and his Horizon
Music Group, the
river and the sea CD
has been released.
My knowing 8 of the 12
tracks
could’ve reduced this release to
another 4 song EP in a series of EPs for me, but it didn’t. The river and the sea comes at this
reviewer as a
full-length CD of a magnitude that just astounds. 3 items jump out
here: Buskey’s
prose, Buskey’s vocals, and the playing of the High Lonesome
Plains.
All 12 tracks are
vignettes of
complex affairs of the heart. Buskey’s
gift of prose and his poetic allegories and alliterations that reach
deep into the heart
and burst forth under metaphors and symbolism steeped heavily with
equal parts optimism,
cynicism, hope, wonder, despair and love, make it hard not to be sucked
into each
individual tale as if it is your own. Using verbal imagery to define
faith and belief in
love, along with all that is good and evil about it, Buskey delivers
sermons without
preaching. He extols virtues of biblical proportions with the sincerity
of someone who has
traveled the green, green rocky road of the heart and has not only cast
his eyes skyward
in prayer and his thoughts soul-searchingly inward, but has also
offered himself up in a
sincere sacrifice of the heart for the person(s) of his love and
affection.
Couple that with a
distinct
and unique, nasally twang of a voice, and
Chris Buskey is staking out a claim to a lyrically significant, vocal
delivery territory
much like that of such identifiable singers as Johnny Cash and James
Taylor.
Along with Chris
Buskey
(vocals, acoustic guitar, Nashville guitar), add the High Lonesome
Plains, Ian Alsgaard (piano, organ,
keyboards, vocals), John Lindberg
(electric guitars, vocals), James Velvet
(bass, vocals, percussion) and Johnny Java
(drums, percussion), and you have a
tight, terse Rock-n-Roll Americana Alt. Country Band. At times piano
driven with solid
sharp drums and bass rhythms punching dirty, distorted, fuzz tone
guitar leads with bold,
grand, open acoustic chords wrapping around intense, personal,
stumbling/struggling vocals
in a full assault, this band knows every nook and cranny of each other
and fills them
precisely where and when needed. The HiLo’s
can also be a modern day hook-filled
massive ensemble not unlike The Band in their heyday. Whether it be a
waltz style death
march, a gritty garage pop, a southern strumming gospel, or an electric
rocker with all
the guts of Neil Young and Crazy Horse, the High Lonesome Plains
deliver a sound that
captures the landscape and atmosphere of the lyrical prose so
perfectly, so intently, so
all-encompassing, that there is nary a misplaced note to draw your
attention away from the
tale(s) unfolding upon your ears and within your heart.
“Words
come true / and in to
view /
Now your heart / it’s black and blue /
What will come / and what will be /
first the river / then the sea.”
the river and the sea
by Chris Buskey
and the High Lonesome Plains
available now for $10.98 + s/h*
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