VARIOUS ARTISTS – Singer Songwriters From Home (Hemifrån MFH 1501)

Here’s a Swedish label celebrating the art of the singer-songwriter with the music of four US exponents: Greg Copeland, Keith Miles, Barry Ollman and Bob Cheevers – all experienced but not well-known outside their home country, hence the tag “Hidden Treasures”.

The compilers and artists have worked hard to avoid the clichés of the genre but even so a good many of the songs fall into the gentle and thoughtful category. The first selection: Copeland’s ‘Wait for Me’, Miles’ ‘Playing Your Guitar’, Cheevers’ ‘These Are My Words’ and Ollman’s ‘Longtime Friend’ fall more or less into this grouping and Cheever’s strays dangerously close to the “you’re my woman etc etc” category. I’ll forgive him that for coming up with the first track that really sets the album alight – ‘The Legend Of Sleepy Hollow’, a rousing re-telling of Washington Irving’s story. It’s preceded by ‘Roughhouse Boys’, Copeland’s reflective Civil War song, and followed by Miles’ country-rocker, ‘Homeland’, recorded fifteen years ago by Kenny Rogers.

Ollman’s ‘Murmuration’ takes a new look at something we’ve all seen at one time or another. It features Tim O’Brien’s mandolin and other guests sprinkled throughout the record include Patrick Sky, Spooner Oldham, Larry Knechtel, Jackson Browne, David Lindley and Garry W Tallent. Of the four, Ollman is the only performer I’m certain that I’ve heard before and while the album is enjoyable enough it lacks the bite I want from a singer-songwriter. A little early Phil Ochs or even Tom Paxton in protest mode wouldn’t go amiss.

Dai Jeffries

Label website: www.hemifran.com

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