Melody Walker & Jacob Groopman
Album: We Made It Home
Label: Self-Released
Tracks: 11 2
Website: http://www.melodywalkermusic.com

Bluegrass singer Melody Walker seems to have come from nowhere, emerging from the ranks of progressive bluegrass band Front Country to win the MerleFest songwriting contest in 2012, roughly at the same time as releasing an acclaimed album Gold Rush Goddess. Getting increasingly closer to her band-mate Jacob Groopman over the past two to three years has led to their building a life together and now releasing a whole album as a duo. Theirs comes across at once as a completely natural, easygoing musical partnership, for all that they arrived there from diverse individual musical backgrounds (Melody was co-founder of women's world fusion acappella outfit AkaBella, while Jacob was into jazz and jugband before being taken on board by the SF Bay Area roots scene); and both are accomplished instrumentalists (both play guitar and banjo, while Jacob adds mandolin).

The majority of the material on their debut joint CD is penned by Melody herself, embodying a thoughtful take on life-philosophy that - unusually for bluegrass - draws on astronomy, feminism, folklore and family history. Check out album standout Black Grace for a sample taste of the power of the lyric invention on display here; this secular humanist gospel song combines scientific and religious concepts of heaven and almost incidentally sports a stunning mandolin solo from Jacob. Other highlights include the preceding track Betelgeuse (more astronomical imagery), the brooding O Heartbreaker (featuring Mike Witcher guesting on resophonic guitar) and the joyful opening title number. The simple percussion-backed chant Yellow-Haired Girl is one of two tracks to benefit from harmony vocals from guest Laurie Lewis, who's also produced the whole album. Alongside the disc's original compositions, Jacob takes the lead on a passionate rendition of the traditional Sweet Sunny South (from the repertoire of Charlie Poole), while the album's select quotient of covers comprises a pleasing, if maybe slightly cautious take on Come On Mule (from the pen of Little Mountain Boys' T.W. Massie), a brilliantly paced delivery of the lonesome Peter Rowan classic Mississippi Moon and a jubilant romp through Paul Simon's Graceland.

All told, this is sheer class: an abnormally fine contemporary bluegrass album that won't ever frighten the horses but contains much to stimulate the senses; once it's "made it home" to your CD player I suspect it will be loth to leave the deck.

David Kidman