The Low-Tech Times

Music Mondays

Even in this digital age, I still buy CDs sometimes. I recently purchased the new A Friend of a Friend album by the Dave Rawlings Machine.

Who Is David Rawlings?

Dave Rawlings is an excellent guitarist best known for his memorable guitar solos, harmony vocals, and co-written songs with his longtime musical partner Gillian Welch. They have released a few albums together and I will devote a future post to their music.

Dave Rawlings is also known for producing three Old Crow Medicine Show albums. As a fan of OCMS, I plan to also write a future article covering my favorite OCMS tunes.

The Songs (Click links to preview/order)

The Friend of a Friend album features Gillian Welch along with members of OCMS, and at times sounds quite similar to the style of music created by those artists.

The original To Be Young almost sounds as if could’ve been written by Bob Dylan, but the instrumental portions of the song sound like an OCMS jam. The old-timey How’s About You and the rockin’ It’s Too Easy also sound like they could fit right into an OCMS album.

One of my favorite songs is the first one, entitled Ruby . When buying the album I was expecting a cover of the Ruby (Honey, are you mad at your man?) song recorded by the Osborne Brothers. Actually, this is a new, original song and it is quite good. It’s a slow song, but has a catchy sing-along chorus with great harmony:

Just like an old time telegraph man,
I came here with a simple job to do.
‘Cause the news comin’ down the wire said
that your world’s on fire
and I’m just trying to get a message through to you.

Ruby is the type of song I wish would get played on modern country radio stations. Alas, that will probably never happen so you’ll have to keep checking sites like the Low-Tech Times to find out about new Americana and American Roots music.

Another favorite tune on the album is Sweet Tooth . We saw this one performed this past year in Charlottesville, VA as part of the Big Surprise tour featuring Gillian Welch and OCMS. It’s a catchy and fun song.

The album also features a bare-bones version of I Hear them All . Dave Rawlings co-wrote this song with OCMS’s Ketch Secor. I definitely like the anthemic OCMS version , but this stripped down version makes it easy to understand the words of this good song.

A cover-tune on this album is Monkey and the Engineer . It’s a solid track, but at first I wasn’t sure much was added vs the Grateful Dead version . However, after listening to it a couple more times, I really like this jazzy version with trumpet and harmonica playing.

My least favorite number on the album is Method Acting / Cortez the Killer , one of only two cover song tracks on the album. This slow song is reminiscent to me of some long slow songs on Gillian’s newer albums e.g. Revelator. Apparently, many people like this style of song, but it’s not my cup of tea.

The album closes with a slow number entitled Bells of Harlem with several violinists participating.

The Album

If you’re like me and still buy CDs, I think this one is worth getting. The CD booklet doesn’t provide lyrics, but you get a few pictures, information on who wrote the songs, and the personnel playing on each track. Amazon.com has the album (click link to preview/order):