Alison Krauss & Union Station Album: “Two Highways”

Allison Krauss and Union Station really hit a bluegrass stride with this album. A traditional sounding collection of songs displays a well suited female bluegrass lead vocal. Allison sometimes gets a little "high lonsome" sounding (Bill Monroe meets Emmylou Harris). Recent recordings show her maturing style as she has softened and diversified her vocals, but this is a tremendous collection that you will be glad to share with purists and even folks that might sit long enough to listen to some good ole time music. With good performances on Guitar, Bass, Violin and Dobro - I think a mandolin snuck into the mix more than once. Musicians will want to play along with this recording to get their chops in shape. Your toes will be taping and a smile will spread across your face.

Still only 17 in 1989 when this, her second album, was released, Alison Krauss made a mark that has kept her atop the heap in Bluegrass ever since. More of a "band" album than her debut, this one also features guitar phenom Jeff White on lead vocals on a few tunes and the instrumentals are among the best Alison has ever recorded, mainly due to Mr. White's hot flat-picking. Old Beaumont Rag got a good workout here!

The album features both traditional material like "Wild Bill Jones" (sung by Jeff White - now performed exquisitely by Dan Tyminski in Alison's Band), and innovative arrangements of material from other genre's. The Allman Brother's "Midnight Flyer" gets turned from rhythmic yearning ballad into a banjo-driven barn burner, with vocals that soar and harmonies that are absolutely hair-raising.

Alyson's voice is noticeably smoother than in the debut album and I would guess it was about HERE that critics began saying that she had the voice of an angel.

I don't personally know what an angel sounds like, but it would be a HIGH compliment to say one sounded like Alison Krauss on "Two Highways".

I grew up in the West Virginia hills and remember going to summer arts and crafts festivals as a kid and listening to the bluegrass musicians sit around in a big circle playing their instruments (many of them homemade) while we kids kept the rythym with stomper dolls. Even though I usually listen to rock & roll, I have always had a soft spot for top quality, traditional bluegrass that reminds me of those summer days of my West Virginia childhood. Nobody does it better than Alison Krauss and Union Station. I'm so glad that Alison didn't give into the Nashville money brokers who wanted to make her a country star at the expense of the beautiful bluegrass music that she and her band play so well.

I was lucky enough to see this young lady (and young she was!) on tour twice when this album had just come out, at the Kalamazoo State Theater along with Hot Rize!, another good old fashioned bluegrass treat. These were the days when Krauss was more famous as a fiddle wunderkind than a pop sensation, and when her voice sounded like a young Brenda Lee or Jimmy Martin's kid sister, rather than the limp but no doubt moneymaking dishrag it does today (Krauss's best contribution these days is her production work with new groups like Nickel Creek.)

These songs....none of which were written by Krauss herself, by the way...are fine examples of what in the eighties was termed "newgrass", a bluer than bluegrass, saucy treatment of American string band tradition. The best example might be Union Station's version of (wait for it) the Allman Brothers' "Midnight Rider", which as an Allmans fan I like better than the original. Many of the other songs are written by John Pennell, founder of the band, still a member, and one who can be credited with discovering Krauss' talent as early as five years before this disc was recorded.

The personnel of Union Station has morphed throughout the years, and a few of the songs are led vocally by musicians who are no longer in the band. But most are Krauss' babies, and she shows them off like a proud country mama. If you have never had a chance to hear Alison Krauss during her early years on the road, do check this, her solo album, or both, out. Your heart will leap to the whirlwind melodies, and you will thank yourself, believe me.

This is the real thing folks - real singers and real musicians making real music. Blow off Shania and Faith and BUY THIS AND EVERY OTHER Alison Krauss + Union Station CD AVAILABLE!!!