Spins: Woke Mountain Boys • Afraid of Leaving Home
Woke Mountain Boys
Afraid of Leaving Home
(Independent)
Long before earning acclaim as a documentary filmmaker (notably including 1997’s In Whose Honor?, examining the use of Native American archetypes in sports), Jay Rosenstein was a local hero on the University of Illinois campus in Champaign. His band Otis and the Elevators were roots-rockers with jam band-adjacent acumen who sold LP copies of 1986 debut Some Career and 1989 follow-up Cross the Bridge by the hundreds if not thousands. If you were an Illinois undergrad drawn to the blissful vibe of the Grateful Dead and fascinated by the heady prose of Bob Dylan, you were probably grooving with Otis at Mabel’s some night when you should have been working on that midterm paper.
Following Otis’s run, Rosenstein continued with other worthy projects, including Silverweed. Yet another has been the Woke Mountain Boys, an even rootsier and more reflective outlet drawing from a palette of Americana, folk, and bluegrass. In 2024, the band makes a surprising return with Afraid of Leaving Home, Rosenstein’s first studio effort in 35 years. The album’s arrival is more than a little fortuitous. These songs were recorded in 2023, shortly after Rosenstein retired from his U of I professorship and only days before relocating from his downstate home to the East Coast. Gathering with talented friends John Tubbs on double bass, Sean Kutzko on drums, and Jesse Brown on keyboards, the quartet spent a single day making intimate recordings of songs Rosenstein had accumulated for many years. These songs turn out to be Rosenstein’s most personal and compelling ever.
“Dinner from a Bag” recounts a bleary-eyed and ruminative road trip, leaving a loved one behind and traveling homeward through the country and pre-dawn light. The cinematic portrait is punctuated by Rosenstein’s reedy harmonica and buoyed by Dyke Corson’s weeping pedal steel, visited approvingly by the ghosts of beloved Illinois songsmiths Steve Goodman and John Prine. The upbeat country shuffle “Soulless Times” wrestles with the dichotomy of feeling beaten back by an avalanche of bitter truths and society’s seemingly willful complacency but still appreciating the opportunity to make a go of it. “I was born into these soulless times, but I’m glad for the chance to be alive,” sings Rosenstein in summary. It’s an admitted curmudgeon’s expression of optimism, rooted in Rosenstein’s flat-picked bluegrass lick. The lively “That’s You, Illinois” is a wry but loving ode to Rosenstein’s home state on his way out the door. Despite its plainly apparent flaws, the singer praises “a beauty that is well concealed.”
Unfolding with the steady sound of Southern folk and gospel, “Afraid of Leaving Home” includes the touch of another figure familiar from the days of Otis and the Elevators. Mudhens guitarist Bruce Rummenie is credited with writing Rosenstein’s spaghetti-western guitar solo. Rosenstein sings to exorcise the fear that dismantles a spirit of adventure or undermines the risk implicit in any kind of growth. “I left and walked a hundred miles, heard the night wind cry and moan,” he sings. “So, I turned and walked a hundred back. I’m afraid of leaving home.”
As an opposite number, “Somewhere in North America” celebrates the freedom to run away in pursuit of a dream. Set against shimmering electric piano, the song is reminiscent of Paul Simon’s understated but captivating fare, which includes “Hearts and Bones” and “Train in the Distance.” The escape from the past and the potential of a new day is echoed in a bluegrass breakdown with effervescent banjo by Ellery Marshall.
The set’s centerpiece is the confessional and relatable “I Owe Time.” The song’s original perspective is shifted and deepened by the water under the bridge since Rosenstein wrote it. An impression of reckless honesty is heightened by the knowledge that Rosenstein’s vulnerable vocal was a scratch take intended only for those in the room playing the song together. “Time is my friend, but now I owe time,” sings Rosenstein atop the rhythm of Kutzko’s brushed drums and the warmth of Tubbs’ rumbling bass. The quartet reacts in real-time with emotion and intuition. Following Rosenstein’s plaintive acoustic guitar twang, the song takes flight with Jesse Brown’s sparkling piano solo. Corson’s steel lends additional pathos. In his liner notes, Rosenstein writes that he hopes the Cowboy Junkies will record the song one day if only someone could pass it along at the right moment. Only Margo Timmins’ voice could make “I Owe Time” more sublime than what’s already here. wokemountainboys.bandcamp.com
– Jeff Elbel
9 out of 10
Category: Featured
