Pete Seeger
Album: Waist Deep In The Big Muddy & Other Love Songs
Label: Talking Elephant
Tracks: 15
Website: http://www.talkingelephant.co.uk

This is a reissue of Pete's 1967 album which capitalises on his high-profile support of environmental and political causes, international disarmament and civil rights during the 1960s. Use of the generic title "love songs" gives an interesting slant on what is basically a self-confessed "patchwork quilt" selection of protest songs and spirituals.

In the latter category, the appearance of favourites such as Down By The Riverside and Last Night I Had The Strangest Dream will come as no surprise, whereas on Seek And You Shall Find Pete preplaces the verses with four old folk stories, delivered in spoken mode, and dedicated to students and teachers. On the aforementioned and on the then-newly-penned Oh Yes I'd Climb (The Highest Mountain Just For You), Pete and his banjo are joined by a vocal chorus comprising a group of young people, and some friends and neighbours, from Pete's home town of Beacon, NY. The enthusiastic, if slightly ragged demeanour of these tracks is appealing enough, but it's on the disc's purely solo items that Pete really scores.

Key to the whole collection, of course, is Waist Deep In The Big Muddy itself - that celebrated Vietnam parable based on a true incident from World War Two - which Pete was banned by CBS from performing on US TV (The Smothers Brothers' Comedy Hour). Other especially fine songs here include the a cappella My Father's Mansion's Many Rooms; Over The Hills; and My Name Is Lisa Kalvelage (a transposition of a statement given to a news reporter by a California housewife arrested for picketing a napalm storage yard).

Along the way, Pete turns in spirited covers of Woody Guthrie's 1941 opus The Sinking Of The Reuben James, and the traditional East Virginia, and there's also two modest, brief banjo instrumentals. This latest reissue appends two bonus tracks (Los Quatros Generales and a fine account of the traditional Come All Ye Fair And Tender Ladies), which very probably emanate from the same album sessions. For this useful reissue, Pete's own sleeve notes are reproduced from the original release.

David Kidman