One Fell Swoop – Self-Titled (EP)
Understated but resolutely bluesy, smoldering but bell-clear; there’s something timeless about this St. Louis band. One Fell Swoop defies one fell label: their sound is acoustic, hip-swiveling and scorched with twang, but it also celebrates the intimacy of lyrical narratives. The band possesses at least two virtuosos: Steve Molitor makes his harmonica sound as the mystery train might have, while Andy Ploof turns every stringed thing into a fountain of melody. They’re tight as honky-tonk, never letting skill dissolve their passion.
The five songs on this self-titled CD are all diverse and appealing, and only sweet on the surface. There’s an undercurrent of danger and descent in the brooding bass of Tony Moore (who was recently replaced by Dade Farrar), and in John Wendland’s concise parables of the disillusioned and abandoned. Cheryl Stryker’s voice is untutored, ripe and raspy, the perfect medium for this CD’s themes. She has the sweet scratch of Lucinda Williams and the knowing timbre of Jean Shepard, conveying emotion with a rawness and directness, like a howl or a moan at dusk.
Lyrically, the songs are compact and subtle, revealing wisdom slowly over repeated listenings. Wendland wrote three of the songs, each surprisingly different: “Fences” offers a helping hand to a lover or friend trapped high on a wall but wonders, “Maybe your feet will get tangled up and fall by the other side.” “Flesh and Blood” is a sharp but gently sung ode to spent passion in which “the only mystery is why you chose to be alone.”
Wendland’s best song is the last: “$500 Funeral” meditates on death and class while ambling through various musical influences. Stryker casts a cold eye on death (but with a warm voice), singing, “85 gets you the Gates of Eden, 12,000 buys you the Greener Pasture Plan.” The song suggests there are deeper contradictions on the other side of economic injustice. “Gram Parsons sang about a $1,000 wedding, Hank Williams sang about his worn out walking shoes, George Jones sang about that old golden ring, I’ve got the $500 funeral blues,” the song concludes in its closing line.
Through a well-deserved stroke of good luck, Neil Young’s manager heard this CD, loved it, and booked the band for Farm Aid in October. From obscurity to a stadium gig; with Swoop’s talent, it’s no wonder. The only question left: When will we hear more?