Crowe on the Banjo: The Music Life of J.D. Crowe

8. The New South: Bluegrass, Country, and More

chapter 8 the new south: bluegrass, country, and more The album the New South had recorded in January was released in September 1975, as Rounder 0044, and created an immediate furor. The cover art was different from most bluegrass albums, and J.D.’s hand, in the band picture, was making what is commonly referred to as “a rude gesture.” “We had a slide one inch square,” Ken Irwin said. “It was the only one in which everybody was smiling. That’s what we made our decision on. I don’t know if the band [seeing the small slide] knew about the finger, but obviously, it showed up when it was a foot square.” “We were kind of on a deadline,” J.D. said. “It was cold, we had gotten aggravated, and were just acting the fool. When we got through, that was the best shot. I said, ‘We’ll send it to Rounder, and if they approve, we’ll use it.’ Well, they did. I got to thinking about it and called Ken [Irwin] and said, ‘On this album cover, what we need to do is print ten thousand albums and change the cover.’ I had this bright idea of making it kind of a [collector ’s item]. I know for a fact that some of those albums, they were paying as high as thirty-five or fifty dollars for, because it was out of print—so it worked.”1 As soon as people opened the album, however, they forgot the cover, and many of them forgot what they had earlier learned about bluegrass i-xviii_1-240_Godb.indd 132 8/3/11 9:28 AM The New South 133 music. The timing, the force, the tightness of the vocals, and the talent of the musicians blended to deliver a new kind of bluegrass that would have a pervading influence. Dave Haney, in his article “Rounder, 15 Years on the Edge,” reported, “The New South album inaugurated a polished, uptown but tradition-based style of bluegrass that attracted a whole new crop of musicians and listeners.”2 Haney, a bluegrass musician himself, is presently professor of interdisciplinary studies and Appalachian studies at Appalachian State University; his graduate-level course in Appalachian studies, Bluegrass Traditions, includes heavy emphasis on Rounder 0044, which he calls “the recording that changed bluegrass.” “[The New South] made the kind of innovation that Flatt and Scruggs had done,” Haney said, “by absorbing all kinds of cultural influences, not setting out to change [others], but saying, ‘We’re playing this music and that’s how it’s going to sound.’ These people realized their link to traditional bluegrass, and made that connection intelligent. They had a different kind of timing, and all bands since have used that timing.”3 “The New South idea aimed at a broader market,” Ken Irwin said. “They were thinking they were going to be something very different, in terms of sound and how they were going to be viewed. [The name] ‘New South’ was a statement of that: southern, but new.” “The New South sound,” Sam Bush said, “is probably the sound more young bands have copied than any other in the last thirty years. Younger people have listened to and copied Crowe more than they have Earl Scruggs. Like Mark O’Connor took Benny Thomasson’s fiddle style and ran with it, it’s the same thing Crowe did with Scruggs. J.D.’s got all sorts of other influences than Scruggs.” “When you saw the ’75 band,” Barry Crabtree said, “or heard the album, thatprettymuchchangedbluegrassforeverybody;itwasawholenewsound.” “That album kind of reenergized things,” Gene Knight said. He was teaching banjo in a music store when 0044 came out. “I’d be back in the practice rooms, and they’d put on that amazing cut of ‘Sally Goodin.’’ I couldn’t keep my mind on what I was doing. There are a lot of people I’ve admired, and still admire, but J.D.’s still the man. He knows when, where, and what not to play is just as important as knowing what to play.” Rounder 0044 transformed not only bluegrass but Rounder Records itself. As Ken Irwin indicated, “It was extremely important in developing Rounder i-xviii_1-240_Godb.indd 133 8/3/11 9:28 AM 134 chapter 8 as a recording significance in the bluegrass industry. We were considered by the bluegrass community at the time to...