I’ve Got A Home In Glory Land

Gospel Supremes “Do, Lord, Remember Me” – Art Rosenbaum recorded the music found on the Art of Field Recording box set over the course of five decades, and as a result, the quality of the audio varies from track to track. There are some unexpected, unintentional benefits to this approach. For example, some of the more recent digital recordings document singers such as Mary Lomax, who performs unaccompanied traditional ballads dating back hundreds of years. Those records are clear and pristine, and place the emphasis on her voice and the words rather than an aural patina of oldness. On the other hand, the relatively poor quality of this recording of the Gospel Supremes from 1977 serves to compensate for the fact that the song’s arrangement is one of the most modern sounds in the set — the band play electric instruments, and the gospel tune is clearly shaped by R&B influences. The fidelity may be shaky, but the recording gives us a strong sense of time and place, and that context adds quite a bit to the charm of this already brilliant performance. (Click here to buy it from Dust-To-Digital.)

Leroy Carr “Christmas In Jail – Ain’t That A Pain” – Yeah, I imagine that spending Christmas in jail is a pain, to say the least. You don’t get a Christmas tree, there’s no turkey meat, and you’re stuck wondering whether anyone is going to bother to post your bail — not very festive! Leroy Carr’s song mixes genuine pathos with some sharp dark comedy, resulting in a piece of music that’s pretty funny up until the point that you realize that this is something that happens to loads of people every year, and in the case of this tune’s protagonist, it’s something of a holiday tradition. (Click here to buy it from Dust-To-Digital.)

Elsewhere: The recently resurrected Rbally site has a truly exceptional recording of a Wilco show from August of this year. Get it while you still can! If you only want to grab a few songs, I recommend “Hate It Here,” “California Stars,” “Walken,” and “You Are My Face.”

Also: A Christmas shopping tale.