{"id":9582,"date":"2018-01-03T15:40:49","date_gmt":"2018-01-03T15:40:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/?p=9582"},"modified":"2018-01-03T23:14:56","modified_gmt":"2018-01-03T23:14:56","slug":"on-dog-bluesman-charlie-parr-sees-canines-on-a-par-with-humans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/?p=9582","title":{"rendered":"On “Dog,” bluesman Charlie Parr sees canines on a par with humans"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Charlie Parr \u00a0Dog <\/em>\u00a0(Red House Records)\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

The great contemporary country blues artist Charlie Parr manages a trick of sly self-portraiture in his new album. His ingenious title song emanates from a dog\u2019s point of view. The hound objects to a human-centric injustice, as Parr sings, \u201cYou say that I need to be trained\/ when I\u2019m only doing what nature demands.\u201d<\/p>\n

That could also be Parr, seemingly born to play nothing more schooled than the most elemental blues, often a one-chord vamp adorned with a repeated fingerstyle arabesque,.three chords at the most. At song\u2019s end, he lets on: Rain down the water that created us both\/ My old man\u2019s soul in this old dog\u2019s coat\/ And a soul is a soul is a soul. <\/em><\/p>\n

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Charlie Parr’s album “Dog” is available both as a CD and a vinyl LP, from Red House Records.<\/em><\/p>\n

Most every song has such a verse of rough-hewn poetry, like several in the naked lament of a failed, perhaps suicidal, father in \u201cHobo.\u201d\u00a0This feels like Parr\u2019s most personal album, with most songs either in the first person or, as in \u201cRich Food and Easy Living,\u201d he enters at the song\u2019s last moment to possibly save the indulgent, prodigal woman from herself.<\/span><\/p>\n

He can also project others\u2019 plights authentically, as in \u201cSalt Water,\u201d which conveys the utter desolation of so many hurricane-flooded people still hanging on today in Texas, Miami and Puerto Rico:<\/p>\n

Heavy air has invaded my past\/ and stolen my family \/ they\u2019re swirling above me \/ high in the mist \/ but I don\u2019t know if I\u2019ll see them again <\/em><\/p>\n

Here and elsewhere, Parr’s plaintively mangy voice wholly befits his material. On the stunning \u201cSometimes I\u2019m Alright,\u201d his faltering pipes sound like his spirit is draining out of him with each exhalation. The Minnesotan knows all about the cold winter of a soul.– Parr admits he struggles with clinical depression, and did during the uphill making of the album. On \u201cLowdown\u201d he tells the story of a deluded loser while inserting a one-line first-person refrain to embody Lowdown\u2019s pathos. Parr\u2019s own struggle only enhances an immensely impressive album, blessed with help from several excellent musicians who lend musical body without fleshiness. It\u2019s just pointed, raw-to-the-bone, heartfelt blues.<\/p>\n

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Parr’s steel resonator guitar playing adds much of the earthy character and energy of his music, Courtesy sweetpeafestival<\/em><\/p>\n

Among his uptempo songs, the defiantly scrambling \u201cAnother Dog\u201d captures the essence of a high-spirited canine with a buzzing, Eastern-toned guitar mode; and \u201cI Ain\u2019t Dead Yet\u201d bristles with Dylanesque attitude and wit:<\/p>\n

Well I ain\u2019t dead yet <\/em><\/p>\n

Lemme have them flowers right now <\/em><\/p>\n

I can\u2019t smell \u2018em so good<\/em><\/p>\n

when I\u2019m locked in that box<\/em><\/p>\n

underneath the ground<\/em><\/p>\n

I ain\u2019t dead yet<\/em><\/p>\n

gimme my flowers now\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Thank the god of dogs (or is it the dog of gods?) that down-in-the-dumps Charlie Parr ain’t dead yet, not by a long shot.<\/p>\n

__________<\/p>\n

This review was originally published in shorter form in The Shepherd Express<\/em><\/p>\n

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Charlie Parr \u00a0Dog \u00a0(Red House Records)\u00a0 The great contemporary country blues artist Charlie Parr manages a trick of sly self-portraiture in his new album. His ingenious title song emanates from a dog\u2019s point of view. The hound objects to a … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9582","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-www-kevernacular-com"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2hJWE-2uy","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9582","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9582"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9582\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9602,"href":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9582\/revisions\/9602"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9582"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9582"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kevernacular.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9582"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}