Country: Prine example of great songs

Sunday, June 10, 2007

By Ralph McLean

After nearly a decade of McLean's Country, the roots and country music show I present every Friday night on BBC Radio Ulster, I must have played the postman-turned-singer/songwriter hundreds of times.

I gave up counting a long time ago.

I'm not exaggerating when I say that barely a day goes by without another heartfelt email or letter arriving in my inbox or the BBC post room singing the man's praises and asking for some obscure track or other.

His popularity in these parts puts the likes of Johnny Cash and Merle Haggard to shame, and while he may not sell like some of his better-known colleagues in the country music field, there's no denying that this man has a cult following that most artists would kill for.

It's been a long career and the great man isn't getting any younger, but there's just something in his songwriting that clearly touches a nerve with Northern Ireland audiences.

For my money, it's the honesty and believability of his work that really hits home.

We like a good story, told with passion and bare-boned simplicity in these parts and Prine's art ticks all those boxes and then some.

Early classics like his harrowing tale of post Vietnam addiction, Sam Stone, still score high with listeners when it comes to picking favourite tracks, but nearly everything old JP has done since he started recording in the early seventies is worth checking out.

His latest release, Standard Songs For Average People, is a perfect example.

Freshly offered up on his own Oh Boy record label, it's a duet album with legendary bluegrass figure Mac Wiseman and it oozes class from every single track.

This is the way all country albums should be recorded. There's no fat, no needless noodling and the playing and singing are of the highest order from the very first note.

Short, sharp songs from the great American songbook are delivered with the kind of down home charm and ease that only comes from decades of shared experience.

Hearing the Illinois voice of Prine sparring with the ageless croon of Virginian Wiseman is beautiful and while those fans looking for great JP originals may be left feeling ever so slightly short-changed, the rest of us can just wallow in one of the best and most traditional country albums of the year so far.

Wiseman is in his 80s now and Prine's voice is undoubtedly showing the signs of damage brought on by illness in recent years, so it's not surprising that most of the songs on offer here trot along steadily rather than racing away, but that's no big problem.

With two performers this good, tackling songs as great as I Love You Because and Death Of Floyd Collins and clearly loving every single minute of it, it's a pleasure from start to finish.

? Hear Ralph on Radio Ulster Monday-Friday from 8-10pm.