The Family - Del McCoury Band (1999)

Bluegrass is a funny critter. It’s a more-or-less modern genre that was born to preserve bygone musical traditions of the old, weird America. But a lot of artists I hear trading on the genre tag seem to think that it demands a traditional–primarily gospel–repertoire.

McCoury has never agreed. He has a long history of taking a bluegrass approach to thoroughly modern music that doesn’t cheat on the tradition. He’s covered the Beatles and Richard Thompson. He has a whole collab album with country-rock iconoclast Steve Earle. This is a traditional sounding outfit that is markedly not traditional in a lot of ways.

Tracks I Liked

Nashville Cats - I suspect there are actually more than 1352 pickers in Nashville but my studies in this area are incomplete

City Of Stone - a stark and spooky tune; one of my favorite McCoury tracks