Halcyon Times Indeed!

In 2010, when it’s the last thing you’d expect, Jason & the Scorchers released a masterpiece.

By Tommy Womack

I’ve put off writing this article for months. I wanted to be sure the CD I received in the mail really sounded like I thought it did, that my mind wasn’t just playing tricks on me. Is it really this good, I thought, or am I just digging hearing songs I co-wrote? I didn’t want to blither sycophantic hyperbole prematurely.

So it’s been a while now, months! Months of starting the record from the top, going through all 14 songs, starting it over, listening again, starting songs over mid-way just to repeat a nice moment, digging a sequence that makes every song better than the one before it, and just marveling in general.

I’m going to say something now that none of you are going to believe, but as a life-long fan who has written extensively about them, and having listened to this record enough times now to know I’m not crazy, here it is: Halcyon Times is the best record Jason & the Scorchers have ever made. Better than Lost & Found, better even than Fervor. If I’m lying, I’m dying. You in the back, sit down. I’m actually serious here.

Fervor had it easy. It was only seven songs and one of them was a Dylan cover. Halcyon Times is twice as many songs, no covers, and each song has something to offer that is equal to anything on that sacred EP of yore. Hand on the Bible.

More points in its favor: Dan Baird & Brad Jones.

The guitar partnership of Warner Hodges and Dan Baird that started with the DB & Homemade Sin record has extended into the Scorchers. Dan appears on almost all the tracks and – just as these two have already demonstrated on the Dan Baird & Homemade Sin record – the marriage of one of rock’s most distinctive twang-shredders and one of its best-ever rhythm players is the best thing this side of AC/DC. It adds a whole new dimension and thrust to what Jason & the Scorchers can sound like and still be Jason & the Scorchers.

There are textures on this record, the harmonies, the ever-so-slight pop touches that are Brad Jones’ signature, and it makes these tracks into something more than another hard rock record. It’s still Jason & the Scorchers and it’s still in your face, but there are little decorations in the sounds that come from a different realm and are something you’ve never heard before on any previous Jason & the Scorchers record.

Photo Credit: Tony MottramJason’s vocals are the most multi-faceted of his career. The almost spoken-word slurs in “Twangtown Blues” are a new turn of phrase for the plain-spoken/sung Midwestern twangster maniac we all know and love. And Jason sang all his vocals at the same time the band was laying down the track, a first at Brad Jones’ behest. The immediacy shows.

Their lyrics have always been great in a plain-spoken country-western way, but the sharp wordplay that flies off of this platter is a personal best. (“Tonight he’ll kill a six-pack, just to watch it die!” “I beat on the mountain, but the mountain doesn’t say a thing.” “He’s a moonshine guy in a six-pack world.”) People live whole lives in single lines. I’m proud to have been on the writing team, in consort with Jason and Warner, or Jason and Ginger (from England’s Ginger & the Wildhearts. No late name, just Ginger), or Warner and Dan, or Al, or everybody who contributed.

The rhythm section of Pontus Snib (drums) and Al Collins (bass) were the guys with the difficult gig here, as in having big shoes to fill. If anyone wants to come against me on my “best ever” claims over this new record, it would have to be how there will never be another Perry & Jeff, and that’s true. But there can be a rhythm section that rocks like hell all the same, which Pontus and Al do.

“These are golden days!” Jason sings in a voice that is joy itself. And they are. Will this record make you a 19-year-old Kappa Sig seeing Jason & the Nashville Scorchers open for R.E.M. at the 40-watt in Athens? No. But these are golden days. Growing older is not a bad thing. If it was, there wouldn’t be so much of it. Get this record if you’re a Scorcher fan, or better yet, give it to a friend. “God bless, God save, golden days!” Indeed.

God bless and Happy New Year,

Tommy