The Hackberry Ramblers – Deep Water
Maybe Ponce de Leon was just a state too far east when he went hunting for the fountain of youth. The Hackberry Ramblers started off playing Cajun music back in 1933, and two of the original members — Luderin Darbone (fiddle, vocals) and Edwin Duhon (accordion, vocals) — remain active. Hence this 1995 recording produced and ultimately released by the rookie in the band, drummer Ben Sandmel, who’s played with them these last 11 years.
The Ramblers have had a linguistically bifurcated existence, with Lennis Sonnier singing most of the Cajun songs and Joe Werner singing most of the English numbers, which were recorded as the Riverside Ramblers. Both are now absent, and guest vocalists take up some of the slack, including Jimmie Dale Gilmore on the title track, Marcia Ball on two tracks, and Rodney Crowell on a couple tracks.
The result is a pleasantly informal disc that plays — complete with spoken introductions — like a live set. Typically, that’s both blessing and curse. Nobody expects instrumental virtuosity from these elder statesmen (good thing, the fiddle sometimes goes badly out of tune, or maybe that’s just a Cajun intonation I’m unaccustomed to), and their voices are predictably creaky, but the joy with which they approach these songs is hard to fault. Even warhorses like “C.C. Rider” (sung by Ball) and “Proud Mary” show unmistakable signs of life.
The piece that’s hard to resist, however, is the title track’s call-and-response pitting Gilmore against the wise Glen Croker. Once again one is reminded of what a remarkable voice Gilmore has, and Croker’s impromptu rejoinder, “Oh, I know, son!”, succinctly speaks to the inestimable virtues of experience.