Rosanne Cash “The River and the Thread” Album Review

Rosanne Cash “The River and the Thread” Album Review

Over the years, Rosanne Cash has wisely built up a cache of ardent fans; fans who are willing to stick by her through every weal and woe and fans who gulp up every note she hums to.  Thus, unlike many burgeoning artists, she’s no longer under the tyranny of recording companies to churn up radio hits and to keep vigilance on her sales figures.  Nowadays, Cash can take her time to smell the roses; she simply has the luxury of releasing a record not because she’s obligated to but because she wants to.  And being in such an esteemed position has privileged her to be more creative, freer to explore issues closer to her heart rather than writing just to catch a hit.  Cash’s former album “The List,” for instance, comprises of 12 songs she personally handpicked from a list her dad Johnny Cash when she was merely 18 years old.  After making her home in New York for years, her new album was inspired when Cash was invited to restore her dad’s boyhood home back in the heart of Dixie Land.

In many ways, “The River and the Thread” is part of Cash’s trilogy of releases connected to her late dad Johnny Cash.  While 2006’s “Black Cadillac” is Cash’s grief stricken farewell to Cash Sr., 2008’s “The List” comprises of songs from her dad’s bucket list of songs while this current opus was inspired by her trip back to her parents’ home.  Thus, “The River and the Thread” has a bittersweet sepia tone nostalgia to it.  Though it’s truly a Southern record rifle with histrionics of the land, it’s by no means a country album.  That is, if we define “country" in terms of the spiky rollicking style of Cash’s 80s heydays when she was ruling the airwaves with “Second to No One,” “Seven Year Ache,” and "Hold On” among many others.  Rather, “The River and the Thread” is a reflective record, the kind that Mary Chapin Carpenter, Shawn Colvin and Cash’s buddy Emmylou Harris are making in their latter careers.  It’s reflective, spiritual, thought provoking and it showcases Cash’s maturity at her craft.

With the serpentine twirling of the electric guitar that harkens the ghosts of the deep Southern and some distorted Keb’Mo-like sounding swampy drums, “A Feather’s Not a Bird” is Cash’s sonic travelogue as she makes her way back to the place and things that mean the most to her.  On this record, you will find Cash flitting through lots of geographical land marks, but it’s through such a journey she also acts as our tour guide helping us to visit various emotional terrains too. “Etta’s Tune” finds us lock in tears land where Cash pays a touching tribute to Marshall Grant who was Johnny Cash’s bass player.  But more than just a professional acquaintance, Marshall and his wife Etta were like surrogate parents to Cash.  Sounding like a cross between a lullaby and a delicate orchestral piece, “Night School” is a nod to Stephen Foster who himself has a deep affection for the South.  Here Cash’s measured yet quietly emotional delivery is easily the album’s apogee.  She does funky with “Modern Blue.”  Not since her “The Wheel” album has Cash packed up so much energy on what is her coolest propulsive rock tune in a long while.  Listening to her hubby cum producer John Leventhal’s crunchy guitar curlicues is worth the price of this album.

 

“The River and the Thread” is also Cash’s most spiritual record: though a new composition, “Tell Heaven” has an old Southern church charm to it where Cash urges us to transfer own sorrows and frustrations from our own shoulders to that of God’s.  While Rodney Crowell’s “When the Master Calls the Roll” (a song Crowell first penned for Emmylou Harris) speaks of reconciliation and healing of those torn asunder by the Civil War.  The song itself is a work of art as it slowly unveils like a script of a novella.  And not to be missed is “50,000 Watts” which speaks of the power of prayer that brims with optimism. “The River and the Road” may not have songs as catchy as her earlier country hits but it’s hugely compensated by its lyrical depth and insights.  This is a record not for the frivolous, but it’s a narrative piece of art for those who want something to chew on for years to come.