CD: “Coal” (Captain Potato”
PERFORMER: Kathy Mattea
ON THE WEB: www.kathymattea.com

Kathy Mattea’s musical career has covered a lot of ground. Born and raised in Cross Lanes, she became one of country music’s biggest stars in the ’80s. After winning numerous awards, she was drawn to Celtic music and began infusing her songs with both the feel and the instruments. Now, shaken by the 2006 Sago Mine disaster, she has come full circle and taken the same spiritual look at her West Virginia heritage.

Mattea, whose grandfathers both worked in the mines and parents were raised in coal camps, has recorded a cycle of songs that focus on the hardships of life in the coalfields. Tapping the spirit — and the songwriters — of the Mountain State, she has chosen some of the most poignant and moving songs about coal mining and taken a public stand against mountaintop removal.

After setting the mood with a pair of well-known Jean Ritchie songs, “The L&M Don’t Stop Here Anymore” and “Blue Diamond Mines,” Mattea moves on to Billy Edd Wheeler’s painfully gorgeous “Red-Winged Blackbird.” In keeping with the subject matter, she has, for the most part, pared her ensemble down to a quartet of meticulously played acoustic instruments (longtime guitarist Bill Cooley and producer/mandolinist Marty Stuart, bassist Byron House and banjo/fiddler Stuart Duncan).

The power of this release is in the lyrics, which, in turn, have inspired a new level of passion in Mattea’s delivery. Along the way there are fine tunes by Si Kahn, Utah Phillips, Merle Travis and Darrell Scott, but the tunes that hit emotional pay dirt (and I may be biased here) are those by Wheeler and Dickens. Just to make sure you get her message, Mattea closes the disc with a medley of Hazel Dickens’ a capella “Black Lung” and “Coal.”

– By Michael Lipton

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