Two great sounds that sound great together
This married pair has appeared together on stage and on one another’s solo releases, but it’s only in the past few years they’ve focused on working regularly as a duo. Their duets on tribute albums, and what at the time seemed a one-off project in 2003’s Happy Holidays (and its 2006 expansion), turned into a deeper collaboration with 2012’s Cheater’s Game, live shows and now a second album. As on their previous releases, they trade leads, backing and harmony vocals, supporting one another with a familiarity that makes duets more than the sum of their parts. Robison contributes a pair of original songs, Willis one, and they fill out the track list with endearingly selected covers.
The album opens with “Departing Louisiana,” a biographical song whose emotional details suggest a Robison original, but it’s actually from the pen of his sister, Robyn Ludwick. When you count in their brother Charlie, it’s clear that songwriting runs in the family. Robison’s “Carousel” evinces the resigned sadness of Roger Miller’s “Husbands and Wives,” but the mood is turned around by the rolling beat and hopeful longing of Willis’ “Lonely for You.” The album’s covers include Buddy Mize’s “Hangin’ On,” sung with the same enthralled powerlessness as the Gosdin Brothers’ original, and a funky take on Tom T. Hall’s “Harper Valley PTA” that’s become a staple of Willis’ live act.
The lead vocal on T-Bone Burnett’s “Shake Yourself Loose” is so shot-through with emotion that you scarcely need the lyrics, and the duo’s harmony work is as bone-chillingly effective as anything sung by Gram and Emmylou. The album closes with the Zombies’ “This Will Be Our Year,” aptly demonstrating how Willis and Robison’s country roots inform everything they do. Like the best duet acts, this pair builds upon their individual talents as singers, forging a third voice that’s the unique combination of the individual elements. Their strengths as singers and songwriters peek through at every turn, but it’s the way their emotional conversation amplifies one another that sets this apart from their solo work. [©2014 Hyperbolium] 