Liberation Hall continues its wide-ranging reissue campaign encompassing all things Blasters-related by getting Phil Alvin\u2019s second solo album, County Fair 2000<\/i>, back into general circulation. Before writing this review I went to consult my original 1994 Hightone Records edition and was unable to find it. While this might speak to the general disarray of my CD library, it could just as well indicate that I didn\u2019t know where to file the album. Blues, country, pop, ragtime, jazz, spoken interludes\u2026 County Fair 2000<\/i> has it all and then some. In fact, it\u2019s that constant genre-hopping that made this record feel a bit like a patchwork to me all those years ago, and thus I was hard-pressed to bring it to mind when I sat down for this review. Hence, my desire to get the original back in hand and, perhaps also, as some kind of sign, its mysterious disappearance.<\/p>\n
If anything, contemporary listening put me in mind of something like a vaudeville show, with New Orleans-inflected jazz like \u201cWhat\u2019s The Reason I\u2019m Not Pleasin\u2019 You,\u201d solo country blues via the beautiful \u201cThat Thing,\u201d and even comedy relief in the form of a version of \u201cWreck Your V-8 Ford\u201d with Billy Boy Arnold and \u201cMr. Satellite Man\u201d with both Mary Franklin and infamous LA rocker, Top Jimmy. I mean, there\u2019s even a version of Sun Ra\u2019s \u201cAnkh.\u201d<\/p>\n
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But if anyone doubts the power of good liner notes, here is a case in point. Again provided by long-time LA-based music writer Chris Morris, they reveal much. In fact, the record *is* stitched together. Originally conceived as a concept album with a spoken narrative, the record retains vestiges of this initial idea. After Hightone nixed the narrative, Phil began to rope in everyone and everything that stoked his enthusiasm, which turned out to be quite a lot. The money ran out long before the enthusiasm, at which point Phil just started recording in people\u2019s homes. Put in this context, I quickly came to a new appreciation of the record. Maybe it\u2019s more like a quilt work of American musical forms performed at the highest level, with Phil\u2019s timeless voice and presence weaving it all together.<\/p>\n
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When I say Phil roped in everyone, I mean the Dirty Dozen Brass Band, Los Lobos\u2019 Cesar Rosas, the then-current members of The Blasters, and even Molly Ringwald\u2019s dad, Bob (piano on \u201cWhat\u2019s The Reason I\u2019m Not Pleasin\u2019 You\u201d). Perhaps most interesting to me is the inclusion of a street musician that Phil admired and befriended, James Bowman. It turns out Bowman wrote (and sings backing vocals on) my favorite song on the record, the lovely, shuffling \u201cKeep In Touch,\u201d done by The Blasters themselves. Again, kudos to Chris Morris for the liners.<\/p>\n
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If it seems like I\u2019m reviewing around this record rather than through it, that may be another indication of how much is going on in County Fair 2000<\/i>\u2019s 56 minutes. So let me summarize by saying that Phil Alvin is one of the treasures of American music, and I believe a person should hear everything he\u2019s ever done. (See my reviews of a couple of Liberation Hall\u2019s Blasters releases, as well as Alvin\u2019s first solo album, Un \u201cSung Stories,\u201d<\/i> elsewhere at The Daily Vault). While County Fair 2000<\/i> might not be the place to start with Phil Alvin, you\u2019ll get here eventually, and you can thank Liberation Hall for making this record available again when you do. It\u2019s also on vinyl for the very first time (although reduced by four tracks due to space constraints).<\/p>\n
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Finally, as you dig into the catalog, spare some healing thoughts for Phil Alvin himself, who has been dealing with health challenges the last few years. Here\u2019s hoping he gets back on a stage soon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":97,"featured_media":35461,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[10931],"rating":[5615],"class_list":["post-47357","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-phil-alvin","rating-rating-b"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/47357","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/97"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47357"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/47357\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35461"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47357"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=47357"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=47357"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}