Other Voices Other Rooms

During the 1980s, Texas singer-songwriter Nanci Griffith graduated from modest folk celebrity to find herself signed to a major label and making thoughtful, better-heeled studio albums that were critical favourites but commercial anomalies in the country market where she was initially positioned. This 1993 project finds her returning to her roots, reunited with the producer behind her earlier folk triumphs, Jim Rooney. Taking its title from Truman Capote's first novel, Other Voices, Other Rooms is a gentle but whip-smart anthology of excellent songs from acknowledged masters (Bob Dylan, Tom Paxton, John Prine, Townes Van Zandt, Woody Guthrie, the Carter Family, the Weavers, Gordon Lightfoot) and lesser-known but hardly less-skilled writers including Kate Wolf, Frank Christian and Vince Bell. Griffith's clear-eyed vocals and unswerving intelligence are well served by members of her own band, augmented by vocal cameos from a roomful of fellow folk veterans including Prine, Arlo Guthrie, the Indigo Girls and John Gorka, among others. --Sam Sutherland

Label: Unknown
Studio: Wea
Released: 1998-01-05
Format: Audio CD