Country: Wayne Scott's This Weary Way

Imagine the music that would’ve been lost if no one had ever recorded Johnny Cash. It’s no exaggeration to say that the world almost experienced an equivalent loss when Wayne Scott’s songs were unrecorded and largely unheard until the 2005 release of Scott’s first album, This Weary Way, as Scott reaches the age of 71.

Father of the incredible songwriter Darrell Scott, the elder Scott has written songs since his teens, but almost never has he performed them. Playing music in many places, Scott always played music by other people. The younger Scott discovered the treasury of songs his father had written when the elder Scott finally showed them to his son. Thankfully, son persuaded father to record this album of original songs.

With a voice and songs like Johnny Cash, the Country form threatens to become Gospel, blues, rock. Duetting with Guy Clark, the walking blues of “It’s the Whiskey That Eases the Pain” starts the album, a Country song that almost ends up in the rockabilly of Bob Dylan’s Love and Theft, while Dirk Powell’s accordion brings in a little Zydeco flavor. A little twist on the bluesy oldie “Walking After Midnight,” Scott’s “When It’s Raining After Midnight” shuffles along on Danny Thompson’s upright bass.

“Sinner” has a bluegrass country feel as Scott says, “Sinner, did you ever go sinning?/Have you ever been down here as lonesome and low as me?” That strong hint of bluegrass comes from the song’s lineup of Tim O’Brien (mandolin), Dan Dugmore (banjo), Casey Driesen (fiddle), and Dennis Crouch (upright bass). It’s the kind of Gospel you find in Cash where the spiritual need is so completely laid bare that you know this song of faith has everything to do with the parts of your heart which are unfaithful.

The spoken word song “The Writer” is the story of the creation music (“In the beginning, the world was without song. . . .”), a reminder that we have needed writers to unleash “harmony and lyrics to help us go on.” Yet, perhaps this is also a reminder that the Writer is God Himself who didn’t just make the physical world but who also is the creative force behind the creative arts.

This Weary Way is deftly played by an incredible gathering of those creative, God-given talents including those already mentioned plus Darrell Scott, Kenny Malone, and others. Yet, you can sense that all of these artists came to let Wayne Scott’s music take the center channel, letting their contributions be the surround sound, so to speak. It’s a great compliment (complement) to the strength of Scott’s music that the songs only needed ornamentation in order to come alive. These artists didn’t have to weld extra pieces onto Scott’s songs to make them into something workable.

Appropriately, one of two covers on the album is Cash’s “Folsom Prison Blues,” where you can hear even more of how Scott’s coming out of the same place as Cash. More than nodding toward a hero, Scott seems to offer it as a known quantity to illuminate the unknown. The unknown Wayne Scott is illustrated very well by pointing to this known.

WIN THIS CD!
See CD Giveaway details below.

Thanks to Wayne Scott, King Easy Records, Full Light Records, Lotos Nile Media, and Echo Music for the review and giveaway copies.