Hangin' On A Star: A Quick Review Of The New Album From Eugene Chadbourne & Jim McHugh (Sunwatchers)

The new record from the legendary Eugene Chadbourne and Jim McHugh (Sunwatchers) bridges the world of folk rock and free jazz. It also makes a compelling case for the improvisational power of both of these players. Bad Scene, out on Friday via Post Present Medium, is also fairly accessible for something this out there.

While the title cut to Bad Scene provides invigorating runs at folk forms, the union anthem "We Have Fed You All A Thousand Years" find Chadbourne and McHugh trading riffs on acoustic and electric guitars. The simple nature of the presentation reveals the methodlogy of the recording, with the whole effect being one that feels like something you've walked in upon while someone was pressing "record" on a tape deck. Woody Guthrie's "Hang Knot" is even better, the banjo (presumably Eugene's) riding atop a country hook as McHugh's guitar strums and chords anchor the cut behind Chadbourne's vocals. The epic, Beefheart-ish "Snowball" sees the duo throw everything together, with styles and riffs colliding around and under delightfully laid-back vocals from Chadbourne. There's fire here, but there's also a kind of slouching grace that gives this real understated power. Bad Scene ends with the rather lovely "Hangin' on a Star", a composition that has a nice drone-y vibe to it, even as Chadbourne's vocals veer into soothing territory.

Recorded in first takes, with a few overdubs, Bad Scene retains a kind of immediate power. This is free jazz, in a sense, but it's also a kind of left-field folk. Call it outsider music if you want, but the tunes here are fairly accessible. It's the instrumentation around some of the vocals that gives this real edge. The whole production works very well, with both Chadbourne and McHugh being in fine form on every track here.

Bad Scene is out on Friday via Post Present Medium.