Song of the Week: First Aid Kit - Emmylou

Johanna and Klara Söderberg hail from Enskede, Sweden. In 2012 the young sisters released The Lion's Roar, their second album, on Wichita Records. The second single from that album, Emmylou, traces the love stories of Johnny Cash and June Carter as well as that of Gram Parsons and Emmylou Harris, and compares them to their own lives. The tight harmony country-esque number reached the top 25 in Norway and Sweden, but failed to make an impression here in the states. We think that's a shame.

Until next time, we'll see you On The Flip-Side!

Song of the Week: The Bootleggers (w/Emmylou Harris) - Cosmonaut

From the 2012 film, Lawless, we have here a lovely little song called Cosmonaut. The song was written by Nick Cave and Warren Ellis (of The Bad Seeds fame. The Australian 80s era band, not the 60s Texas band). It should be noted that Nick Cave also wrote the screenplay for the film. The song is credited to The Bootleggers, which I believe to be a collective for this movie project, and features the wispy and gentle vocals of Miss Emmylou Harris. She's received a lot of love from us in the past and she makes her 3rd appearance here at On The Flip-Side. She can be found on this Gram Parsons post and on this The Band post. That may be a record. Go figure.

I hope you enjoy this gentle ramble.

Morgan

Song of the Week: The Band with Emmylou Harris - Evangeline

Last week a part of the brain trust that is On the Flip-Side explored a selected work by Gram Parsons entitled A Song For You. But as we looked back on our selection -- as we like to do -- we felt we failed to satisfactorily credit Emmylou Harris for her huge contribution to the success of the beautiful Parsons song. Well, lucky for all of us, Emmylou Harris returns for a second straight week (an honor not ever bestowed before) on our Song of the Week selection.

This week's installment finds the crack staff at Flip-Side's Rocky Mountain offices listening to copious amounts of the Canadian/American band, The Band. In particular we have been listening to the Robbie Robertson penned waltz, Evangeline as it was filmed on a soundstage in San Francisco by Martin Scorcese for the must-own 1978 film, The Last Waltz.

The song demonstrates vintage Robertson lyrics of a romanticized Southern heritage lost or never had. In this instance he explores the sinking of a riverboat named The Mississippi Queen that takes down the gambler, Bayou Sam, to a watery grave. Evangeline, his faithful lover, "high on the top of Hickory Hill/she stands in the lightning and thunder" as she is forced to watch helplessly as the Mississippi Queen goes under.

In one of three scenes filmed on a sound stage, we get to see The Band as they rotate their musical instruments and nicely showcase their multi-threat vocalists. The always-pain-stricken sounding Rick Danko opens with the first verse and then gives way to the angelic sounding, and looking, Emmylou Harris who, in contrast to last week, gets a much deserved vocal lead here. Then, after a brief music break in which Arkansan Levon Helm, who usually mans the drums, takes us on a nice little tour of his mandolin skills and shows why he is one of my all-time favorite singers. After that, it's some pretty sweet 4-part harmonies as Richard Manuel joins the others to fill out the last two verses. It's a more than pleasing sight to watch. 

Song of the Week: Gram Parsons - A Song For You

"Jesus built a ship to sing a song to." At least that's the way Gram Parsons sees life. It's one of those curious lines from a song that just sticks out to me as being so quizzically beautiful that it makes me smile with wonderment every time I hear it.

This week's installment of Song of the Week is filled with those type of lines. The song is A Song For You from Gram Parsons' first solo album, GP, released in January of 1973. In my humble opinion, the song is the standout on the more than solid album. 

Gram Parsons, like all good musicians who died far too young, has become a bit of a legend. The stories of his multi-million dollar upbringing, his exploits, his death at the tender age of 26 and his bizarre burial have been overstated too many times and I won't bother to repeat them here. If you want to read about that, just go to our friend, señor wiki. What's important here is that Parsons had a major influence on the evolution of music. You need not look any farther than Wilco, Calexico, Whiskeytown or the Jayhawks to see his direct influence. Long story short, Gram Parsons is often credited with creating "country rock" through his groundbreaking work in the International Submarine Band, his stint in The Byrds, his formation of the band The Flying Burrito Brothers with fellow Byrds Alumnus, Chris Hillman, and, of course, Parsons' two solo albums. In fact, he probably gets too much credit, but I digress.

Let's get back to our Song of the Week, A Song for You. The song is simple as could be. This does not succeed because of the stellar musicianship -- which includes James Burton of Elvis Presley fame, Emmylou Harris and Barry Tashian of the Remains fame -- but because of the sincerity of Gram Parsons himself. Parsons was gifted with a sweet voice and the ability to paint a different color on your front door with his lyrics. I always get a sense that his songs are deeply personal but shared with a larger audience as a tool to articulate what he can't say to the real intended recipient: "I loved you everyday, and now I'm leaving. And I can see the sorrow in your eyes. I hope you know a lot more than you are believing, just so the Sun don't hurt you when you cry."

I'm going to cut it off here, and just ask you to stop and really listen to all the lyrics in this song. Pay particular note to how and when Emmylou Harris harmonizes with Parsons, bringing importance to some lines more than others, and how Parsons' voice wavers under the strain of his words.