Search - Court & Spark :: Bless You

Not since Wilco emerged from Uncle Tupelo has such a skillful group of what are, essentially, indie kids added so ambitiously to the alt-country canon. Bless You taps into the spirit of 1950s Nashville and 1960s and '70s Los Angeles to create an album that's soulful and earnest, with crystal-clear production and an Appalachian sound that eludes most No Depression-era artists. Like the foremost of their musical brethren--Gillian Welch, Varnaline, Neko Case, etc.--the Court & Spark have also been legitimated by the support of a bona fide country-rock pioneer; in this case it's former Byrd and Flying Burrito Brother Gene Parsons, who joins the string section on three of the band's recorded songs. Nonetheless, Bless You finds the quartet neglecting the playfulness and joy that characterize songs by predecessors and peers alike. Through all the album's beautiful waltzes and shuffles, wispy vibratos and stirring harmonies, the romantic wistfulness it affects so consistently eventually becomes its one flaw. But with an upbeat tune or two, or for a melancholy mood or rainy day, Bless You would be perfect. --Sarah A. Sternau