CD Review
Artist: Rick Faris
CD Title: Life's Parade
Label: Dark Shadow Recording
Artist Website: https://rickfaris.com/home
Label Website: https://darkshadowrecording.com/

I received Rick Faris's CD Life's Parade a while back. Two eye surgeries later, I can sit down and write this review with clear vision. While my eyes were sandbagging on me, there wasn't anything wrong with my ears. So, I listened. I listened a lot. I started with a casual listen, and like a lot of other bluegrass albums from bluegrass, I was immediately greeted with what I expected: solid picking, tight harmonies, great singing...all the things we expect and get, but where's the extra? What's separating Rick Faris from the rest?

It was about the third listen through that it really began to speak to me. I'm really listening to the songs, beginning to really hear the band, the lyrics, the knocks and segues into instrument solos, the kickoffs, the endings, the interplay between musicians in the band, the percussive tones of the acoustic instruments, the hard cut of an aggressive mandolin solo, the sweet notes of a guitar lick opening up a ballad, the drag of melodic phrases on the fiddle, a single perfectly placed harmonic note on the banjo, and the expressive voice blending with the lyrics and melodies. Some of you may be able to take all this in on the first listen. I can't. It took me dozens. But, each new piece I actually heard cemented itself in my memory, every time yielding a new dividend: something heard now that was not heard heretofore, but once heard, retained and built upon, even to the sound of a finger sliding along a string, a bit of buzz on a fret or two, or the actual sound of the rosin on the tensioned horse hair creating just the right amount of friction on a fiddle string. It's all right here.

There's twelve songs on this CD. Faris assembled an all-star cast: Dan Tyminski, Harry Clark, Henry Burgess, Ron Block, Russ Carson, Laura Orshaw, Maddie Denton, Mark Schatz, Dennis Crouch, Jim Bob Faris, Shawn Lane, Eddie Faris, Maddie Dalton, Stephen Mougin, Gibson Davis, and Jason Carter. Every song is an original, which I really like, most penned by the team of Rick Faris and Rick Lang, with a couple of songs crediting Mark Brinkman, Evan Brinkman, and one by Faris himself. I am all for new music. New music is life. Old music is my life. New music is my growth. Congratulations to Faris and all the Bluegrass bands who grace us with new music.

The songs are:

1. Bend Don't Break
2. Can't Sing the Blues No More
3. Lonesome Is Your Name
4. Storm Clouds
5. On the Right Track
6. Bridge of Dreams
7. The Sound of Lonely
8. You Don't Know What You're Missing
9. Story of My Life
10. Words in This Song
11. Can't Remember to Forget
12. The Rabbit Hole

My picks are “Bend Don't Break," “Lonesome Is Your Name," “Storm Clouds," “Bridge of Dreams," “Story of My Life," “Can't Remember to Forget," and “I Been Down This Rabbit Hole Before.” All these songs uplift. They edify. They restore. What a refreshment among the daily chaos. I wish everyone's heart had something to celebrate, not tear down. There's something to celebrate in the heart of Rick Faris. It took me a few times to get it, but he was steadily telling me. I just had to stop and really hear.

I heard a wonderful echo of Pat Enright, Alan O'Bryant, and the Nashville Bluegrass Band in “Lonesome Is Your Name.” Faris slides up to a high note that gives me goose bumps. At first, I think he's not going to make it, but that was bait. Of course, I knew better, but I took the bait anyway. He reeled me in. Before, I could only think of two who could pull off such range and still keep that powerful blues moan in it. Now I can think of three. You may not realize what a compliment that is, but in my book, any comparison to the NBB means you're at the pinnacle. I heard it on “You Don't Know What You're Missing,” too. I really like that.

And if you were looking for an absolute burner to send you off into the day with a spring in your step, follow Rick Faris and the band down that rabbit hole. Catch them if you can.

Once more, Stephen Mougin and the team at Dark Shadow Recording are bringing us some of the freshest, most important work in Bluegrass music. Rick Faris and Life's Parade are part of that. Thanks to their ear and ability to recognize fresh and unique artists who bring more than superb musicianship. There's a lot of that. Where is the extra? What is extra even? I may not know that extra is well enough to define it, but I know it when I hear it, and there's plenty of it on Life's Parade. Congratulations, Rick Faris.