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"The Pilgrim"
Marty Stuart has always been a terrific
singer and picker , but only rarely has Stuart written songs
worthy of his other talents. However, on The Pilgrim, a concept
album that tells a true story from Marty Stuart's Mississippi
hometown, he has finally found a theme to inspire a whole collection
of substantial songs. The title character falls in love with
a woman at work, discovers too late she's married, watches her
husband kill himself, flees the town for years of drunken wandering,
and finally finds redemption in religion and marriage. Here are
the great themes of hillbilly music--infidelity, violence, rambling,
alcoholism, church and family--wrapped up in an ongoing narrative.
It's not surprising that Stuart can get satisfying results from
this material when he reaches back to older musical styles and
such guest performers as George Jones, Johnny Cash, and Earl
Scruggs. --Geoffrey Himes |
