Ralph White: press

Non-traditional traditional? Indo-African mountain songs? Rocking-chair string ephemera? What longtime Austinite and former Bad Liver Ralph White puts on albums and onstage is so mind-boggling and vast, it forces those of us in the description business down a treacherous path. His five-string fretless banjos and African kalimbas – resonating thumb pianos – mix with accordion and fiddle to create an Eastern Appalachian sound, but it's much more complicated than that. White's second solo release, Navasota River Devil Squirrel, is displacement on disc. It's the culmination of years of experimentation and travel woven into a magic carpet, jetting off hither and fro, crossing continent boundaries and civil wars. Opening traditional "Look Down That Road," transforms into a psychedelic atlas on White's twangy voice and hypnotic kalimba. Originals like instrumental fiddle/accordion romp "Navasota River Devil Squirrel 1 & 2," the vocally distorted "History 1 (Conspiracy Theory)," and eerie closer "Devil Squirrel 3" saddle up alongside early-century fables as though they were long-lost cousins. White's melodies and lyrics scratch the surface of the Old World, leaving just a contemporary hint of now. Therein lies the magic.

Trash Fish, the solo debut record from former Bad Livers' banjoist Ralph White, is at once charming, personal, magical, and wonderful. The base of the music is found in the old-timey mountain songs that also formed the root of White's work with the Livers. The spooky melodies (both traditional and original) are treated by White and crafted gorgeously on his eight-track. Like the Bad Livers, White takes an unorthodox approach to traditional American music and, in the bargain, has created something more beautifully in touch with the spirit of the music than most staunch traditionalists could ever dream of. Buried in the opening number, "Unwound," and emerging little by little over the disc's dozen tracks, White finds an utterly new and beautiful combination of traditional instruments: the five-string banjo mixed with the mbira and kalimba, African thumb pianos. The gritty gutbucket pluck of the banjo melds gorgeously with the warm, gentle twinkle of the metal percussion. It is with these tools that White turns in one of the most original performances of "Corrinna" (among other tunes) that has been heard in quite some time. His voice is casually confident, singing in the ageless drawl that permeates mountain music...all that is needed to convey the majesty of the music is the banjo, the mbira, and White's voice. A wonderful album.