It was another case of ‘Boulder to Birmingham’ at the
Kitchen Garden Café this evening, albeit there was no sight or sound of the
Emmylou Harris classic. What we did have on offer was a highly talented quintet
of musicians, once again leaving their hometown in Colorado, and on this UK
tour paying a visit to the Second City suburb of Kings Heath. The Railsplitters
are the latest in a long line of old time string bands to grace this venue and
the evidence on show suggested that they are up there with the best. Throughout
this twin set show, the band was rarely shy on attempting to re-define the
scope for the type of music they love with sporadic references to pop grass,
new grass, Colorado green grass and occasionally offering defiance to the
bluegrass police. Putting sub-genre subtleties aside for a moment, the chosen
gathering at the Kitchen Garden Café was ultimately privileged to listen to a procession
of super sumptuous sounds from the full range of fiddle, banjo, guitar,
mandolin and double bass.
While Boulder, Colorado is the base for The Railsplitters,
the band members have gravitated to the Rocky Mountains from places as far away
as Mississippi, Michigan, Alaska and, even Brazil was mentioned. The journey to
Birmingham for this show was a little less on the mileage chart with their
previous port of call being a gig at the American Museum in Bath earlier in the
afternoon. In fact, two shows in one day had the band buzzing with an equal
spread of irreverent chat keeping things light hearted during the song breaks,
often necessitated by the obligatory tuning, especially for the banjo.The song scale for The Railsplitters was primarily based on
their two studio albums to date, sprinkled with a smart selection of
contrasting covers. It was of little surprise to hear the band cover an
excellent Bela Fleck fiddle tune (‘Down
in the Swamp’) and a Dillards number (‘Whole
World Round’), but more so to steam full ahead with Buddy Holly’s ‘Oh Boy’. The latter was the guilty pleasure
of bassist Leslie Ziegler, while the first of this trio proved the perfect
vehicle for the fiddle playing of Christine King to excel.
These two musicians may have been positioned on the flanks
of the stage line up, but were core to the whole sound of The Railsplitters in full
play. Next to these two ladies were the two men in the band, namely banjo player
Dusty Rider and Peter Sharpe on mandolin. Both these fine musicians were the
architects of many of the band originals with Peter being credited with amongst
others the song ‘Boarding Pass (That’s
the Way It Is’)’ from their 2013 self-titled debut album. While the
harmonies were aplenty, Dusty did a fair amount of the solo vocals in tandem
with Lauren Stovall who was also responsible for the guitar work in this
musical ensemble. If a focal point for The Railsplitters had to be anointed then
Lauren would probably get the nod, however the great British political term of ‘first
among equals’ is a more suitable description of the band. Apart from the bulk
of the lively chat, Lauren impressed immensely with her vocal contribution which
had more than a tinge of Southern class especially on the standout song of the
night ‘Jackson Town’, referencing her
Mississippi roots.
As indicated earlier, the evening rolled out as a two set
gig with the band active selling CDs, both in the interval and at the end. Two
songs that further impressed in the first half included the traditional tune ‘The Cuckoo’ which raised much debate whether
it had its roots in the UK or the US. The other was a Katie Bowser song from
Nashville going by the name of ‘Where You
Are’. There were numerous stories attached to many of the songs especially ‘The Estuary’ in the second set and the Leslie
composition ‘Blue Moon’. Two other
traditional songs worthy of a mention came in the final stages of the evening
in the guise of ‘Bright Sunny South’
and the inevitable encore piece ‘Fly
Around’, complete with the exaggerated line ‘crazy’ exemplifying the band’s
desire to end on a high note.
This Birmingham date, which evolved into a highly enjoyable
evening, was in the early stages of this tour for The Railsplitters. The
indication was that the band was beginning to hit their stride and this bodes
well for folks catching them later in the tour. Alongside their debut album,
the band was also selling copies of the 2015 album THE FASTER IT GOES with many
songs from this release featuring during the show. It was a pleasure to witness
a positive, vibrant and accomplished band play a style of music, authentic in
its attention to detail yet progressive in its interpretation. Boulder to
Birmingham may be a long way, but metaphorically they were in each other’s
pockets this evening.