Ghosts Of West Virginia, Steve Earle and The Dukes (New West): Album Review

Steve Earle’s latest album, Ghosts of West Virginia, arrives full of Appalachian hillbilly, the Blue Ridge Mountains and unabashed, bluegrass fiddle. It is also the soundtrack to an off-Broadway play. Rev Orange Peel offers his review.

——————————————————————

The Upper Big Branch Mine in Raleigh County, West Virginia is where 27 miners lost their lives in an explosion on April 5^th 2010.

Nineteen months later, the report by the Mine Safety and Health Administration found numerous breaches of safety regulations had contributed to the final culmination of that tragedy. Over $200 million US in fines and reparations were paid out by the owners, Massey  Energy.

Six years later, playwrights Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen are in Charleston, West Virginia. Donald Blankenship, a former CEO of Massey Energy, has been found guilty of conspiring to violate Federal safety standards at the mine, and is being sentenced. They are there to interview family members of the miners killed. Initially reticient, but slowly they gain the confidence of the wives and parents and are able to talk.

The story of the tragedy is worked up for theatre. The story is completed with songs and music by Steve Earle.

Fair to say Earle wears his left-wing beliefs on his sleeve. He and the Dukes regularly play in West Virginia, but he admitted that this was deep in the heart of Trump country.

It’s a conundrum. America is divided. Artists and entertainers, writers and musicians see the current President as a pariah. Coal country is the opposite, heavily supporting Trump and his stated aim to support working class, coal and oil industries. The play and the music which makes up the album is an attempt to bring empathy between the division which has been building for a long time. It opened off Broadway on March 3^rd and closed 22^nd March.

The Dukes are generally superb and carry the album sonically. It is Appalachian hillbilly, country mountain music, bluegrass fiddle. With a beat, but not obtrusive. So it’s modernised and would possibly be what Sun Records would sound like in the era of Americana.

A quick roll call. Chris Masterton guitar, Ricky Jay Jackson pedal steel, Eleanor Whitmore fiddle, Jeff Hill bass, Brad Pemberton drums. Someone’s  playing banjo.

John Henry was a Steel Drivin’ Man is a Woody Guthrie style ballad. Industrialisation driving   men out of work.

It’s About Blood is even more a polemic. Then it finishes with a roll call of the dead miners.

Fastest Man Alive is pure Springsteen.  Sounding a lot like Open All Hours from Nebraska.

If I Could See Your Face is a nice change. Sung beautifully by fiddle player Whitmore, an old Country lament missing the partner who will never return home at night again.

Time is Never on my Side. Black Lung. What life is and the damage sustained.

The lyrics work best when they are observing everyday realities and surround it with uplifting music, which is what country music (and blues) is all about.

Rev Orange Peel