Bill Monroe killed bluegrass. Most people would have you believe that he's the genre's undisputed pater familias and there would be no such thing as bluegrass without him. Well, that's true too, but he's also responsible for its lack of vitality as an art form, its stagnation, and its relegation to the museum to gather dust.
He did this by defining it too specifically, by stating (both verbally and implicitly through the wild success of his music) exactly what bluegrass is. As a result, he hermetically sealed it, and cut it off from the influence of other kinds of music, which is what keeps a musical style alive and vibrant. It's ironic, considering the alchemy Monroe dabbled in to create bluegrass in the first place-- mixing together hillbilly, old-time string band music, western swing, classic folk balladry, jazz, etc. Nevertheless, it's ultimately his fault that there hasn't been much significant development in bluegrass since he cut his classic sides with Columbia in the mid-to-late 40s with the Bluegrass Boys.
No musical genre is more haunted by its past than bluegrass-- not even reggae. Monroe's specter looms so heavily over the practitioners that most seem unwilling-- or more likely unable-- to push the form forward. The critic Harold Bloom called it the anxiety of influence, and in the case of bluegrass it's stultifying. Sure, there are stylistic shadings and sub-genre stratification if you really get into it, but basically it all comes down to Monroe. He embodies the form. It's similar to Andre Breton and his tyrannical control over the Surrealists (i.e., defining the terms, determining who was a surrealist and who wasn't), only in the case of bluegrass, Monroe's right to final say was accepted without much fuss.
I've been to my share of bluegrass festivals, and while I appreciate the tradition and the musicianship bluegrass musicians almost invariably possess, it's hard not to feel like you're at a funeral when you're at these things, and not just because many of the pickers and fans are septuagenarians. You almost wish someone would do something tacky and desperate, like pull out a drum machine or plug in a theremin just to stir things up.
Jim and Jennie and the Pinetops are raging against the dying of the light while at the same time dragging the carcass around with them. And I'm not sure how worthwhile the whole exercise is. The Philadelphian neo-bluegrass outfit, probably best known to indie rock fans for appearing on Songs: Ohia's Didn't It Rain, have a good outing on their new record One More in the Cabin. Yet, while pleasant enough, it surely isn't anything that's going to give bluegrass that long-overdue kick in the pants. But maybe these days that's all you can rightly ask of a bluegrass album-- that it be enjoyable, a good collection of songs to listen to on Sunday morning.
One More in the Cabin sticks to the tried-and-true components of canonical, classically defined bluegrass: the high lonesome sound, the close harmonies (a nice touch given the male and female vocalists here), the standard five-piece guitar/bass/banjo/mandolin/fiddle instrumentation, the frenetic breakdowns followed by the rollicking ballad, and, for the most part, the lyrical subject matter (i.e., death, the weather, apple trees, etc.). In fact, this last item might reveal the most outstanding thing about the Pinetops: listening to the album before reading the liner notes, I was sure I'd heard some of these songs before. But they're all originals. One song in particular, "Mourning Dove," had me convinced the liner notes must be wrong-- I was certain it was an old timey standard. But, no. It's just a good solid song, that, by all rights should be a standard someday. Isn't it a little sad, though, when the measure of success within a style of music isn't originality but how close the music comes to the accepted standard?
Of course, the demographic who made the soundtrack to the movie O Brother, Where Art Thou? a fluke hit-- the NPR/Borders crowd-- will eat this up. That's not a putdown exactly, it's just a marketing tip. And there sure as hell are worse things they could be sippin' lattes to (Sting). But ultimately, One More in the Cabin is yet another tombstone-- a well-crafted one, yes, but a signal of doom all the same, an indicator of the sad, ironic fate of the music whose founder was so damn good his hegemony became oppressive.
