THE KENNEDYS: Songs of the Open Road

The Kennedys

Songs of the Open Road

© 2006 Appleseed Recordings

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Modern folk-rock’s standard bearers present new versions of their favorite classics and lesser-known gems, from The Byrds and Burrito Brothers to Victoria Williams and Dave Carter.

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ABOUT "SONGS OF THE OPEN ROAD":
Last year’s “Half a Million Miles” celebrated musicians Pete and Maura Kennedy’s first decade of married life and their first 500,000 tour miles as increasingly beloved purveyors of an exuberant blend of folk, rock, country, pop and secular gospel music with philosophical underpinnings. On “Songs of the Open Road,” The Kennedys forego their self-composed songs of transcendent twang to present new versions of their favorite traveling music written by others that fit their own musical and personal outlook.

Pete and Maura’s on-the-road listening time, deep-catalogue musical knowledge and ongoing “Dharma Café” show on SIRIUS Satellite Radio have equipped them well to select and sequence the 14 songs that they recorded for this, their ninth disc. The first shimmering seconds of the CD’s opener, Victoria Williams’ tranquil “This Moment,” are like the initial plunge into a cool, calming pool, as Maura sings about appreciating each unique instant in life. After attuning us to the eternal now, The Kennedys launch us into the skies with a soaring version of one of their longtime onstage standards, The Byrds’ “Eight Miles High,” lifting off on a psychedelic swarm of guitars, electric sitar, and kinetic rhythm section, with multi-instrumentalist Pete providing shadow-close harmonies to Maura’s sweet ’n’ sassy lead vocals.

The California folk-rock-country sound is heard frequently on “Songs of the Open Road” as The Kennedys play their way through the pantheon of great West Coast-based writers. Three former Byrds are represented by the cautionary “Sin City” (co-written by Gram Parsons and Chris Hillman while in the Flying Burrito Brothers) and Gene Clark’s elegantly mournful “Gypsy Rider,” a lonely highway classic. The sweet bossa nova lilt of Stephen Stills’ “Pretty Girl Why” (from the final Buffalo Springfield album) soothes the apocalyptic anguish of Bob Dylan’s “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall,” which precedes it. “Galveston,” Glenn Campbell’s 1969 hit written by Jimmy Webb, is a more oblique anti-war commentary, sung from the viewpoint of an overseas soldier yearning for his home and the girl he left behind. Americana pioneer and California native John Stewart, provides the newest song on the album, the wistful “Jasmine” (from his 2006 Appleseed CD, “The Day the River Sang”), an alluring siren’s call to tour, while the legendarily enigmatic Bob Neuwirth’s “Eye on the Road” spells out the dangers of answering that sweet summons.

The ache of the traveling musician is also the theme of “Late Night Grande Hotel,” written by The Kennedys’ friend and former employer, Nanci Griffith. Pete and Maura honor another soulmate, the late Dave Carter, whose original songs and partnership with Tracy Grammer mirrored The Kennedys’ naturalistic philosophy and relationship, by covering his twinkling “Happytown (All Right with Me)” and the yearning “Gypsy Rose,” a lovely remembrance of a long-gone lover.

Rounding out the CD are a rousing version of Mahalia Jackson’s gospel declaration, “I’m on My Way,” and a rocking rendition of “Raging Eyes,” penned by the collection’s one non-Yank, Nick Lowe, England’s delightful popsmith.

With its wide assortment of source material, delicate thematic threads, and sparkling vocals and arrangements, “Songs of the Open Road” can’t fail to expand The Kennedys’ reputation as imaginative and joyful musicians, conceptualists and “a positive force on all things human” (Folk & Acoustic Music Exchange).

ABOUT THE KENNEDYS:
The story of Pete and Maura Kennedy’s personal and professional relationship, now in its second decade, is somewhere between fate and a fairytale. How else can you explain a chance meeting in Austin between two East Coast-born musicians that immediately sparked a songwriting collaboration, a first date at Buddy Holly’s grave, an enduring romance, and a creative partnership that radiates warmth, positive energy, and captivating music?

In 1992, Virginia native Pete Kennedy was playing a solo show at Austin’s Continental Club on a brief sabbatical from his duties as country-folk singer-songwriter Nanci Griffith’s lead guitarist when he met former Syracuse, NY, resident Maura Boudreau, enjoying a night off from performing with her own country-rock band, The Delta Rays. The duo “instantly connected on a soul level, or maybe even something deeper,” according to Pete. They wrote their first song together the following day before Pete returned to the road, and rendezvoused ten days later at mutual hero Buddy Holly’s grave in Lubbock, Tex., 500 miles equidistant between them. And that’s how it started . . .

When Griffith needed a harmony singer to replace Iris Dement on short notice for a British tour in Spring ’93, Maura was the obvious choice, and her touring life alongside Pete began. While boarding the plane to England, Nanci informed the duo that they would serve as the opening act for many of the shows on her tour, as well as performing in her backing band. With a need for material to fill their set, Pete and Maura wrote an inspired set of songs in Dublin that would become the basis for their first album, 1995’s “River of Fallen Stars,” which earned an “Indie” award as “Best Adult Contemporary CD” by the National Association of Independent Record Distributors.

The body of work The Kennedys have created since their 1994 wedding is a reflection of their musical and philosophical influences and experiences separately and as a couple. A child of the ’50s, Pete was compelled to pick up his older sister’s guitar after seeing The Beatles perform on “The Ed Sullivan Show” and was soon playing “Louie Louie” and “Satisfaction” in a garage band while also absorbing the new sounds of The Byrds and folk-rock. After a year of studies at Boston College and with disco music just around the corner, Pete “started to lose interest in pop and got into taking the long view of the guitar.” He returned to Virginia and immersed himself in classical and jazz guitar, studying with master players Joe Pass and Johnny Smith in the late ’70s and early ’80s. The rise of the “alt.country” scene in the mid-’80s reignited Pete’s interest in contemporary music and he became a first-call session player in the Washington, DC, area. When fellow picker John Jennings took a sabbatical from his role as Mary Chapin Carpenter’s lead guitarist, Pete stepped into his shoes. On a final show with Carpenter in 1991 (on “Austin City Limits”) before she took a hiatus for songwriting, Pete sat in with fellow guest Nanci Griffith, was invited to join her band, and accepted.

Meanwhile, Maura Boudreau was learning there was more to music than pop when she started working in a used record store in Syracuse in the mid-’80s. There she discovered Fairport Convention, the British Invasion bands of two decades earlier, and, most significantly, country-rock singer Emmylou Harris, whose recordings led Maura to the traditional music of Patsy Cline and the Louvin Brothers. She subsequently switched from playing Fairport-influenced material to forming the country-oriented Delta Rays and also started writing her own songs. A trip to Austin’s SXSW music showcase in the late ’80s convinced Maura to relocate her band there, although all but one of the original Delta Rays opted out of the move.

After Pete and Maura’s fateful 1992 meeting (the subject of their last CD’s title song, “Half a Million Miles”) and several years of touring and recording with Nanci Griffith, the duo seceded amicably from Griffith’s Blue Moon Orchestra and became The Kennedys, recording CDs that encompass their favorite musical styles while incorporating the naturalistic, transcendental and mythological teachings of Joseph Campbell, Eckhart Tolle, Walt Whitman, and various Eastern-oriented philosophers into their songs and lives. Their goal is to live in the moment, appreciating every second of sensation, which imbues their music with a constant sense of wonder and freshness.

As confirmed road warriors and performance addicts, The Kennedys have logged well over 1,000 gigs and half a million miles of touring, bringing their songs and spirit to venues ranging from the prestigious Newport, Falcon Ridge and Kate Wolf music festivals to the most intimate house concerts. A fearsome accident on the New Jersey Turnpike last year totaled The Kennedys’ third touring van and eventually influenced them to shift their home base from New York’s East Village to more laid-back headquarters in Northampton, Mass. They continue to tour constantly, to record (they have three new projects already on tape), to host their “Dharma Café” show on SIRIUS Satellite Radio channel 24, and to spread their exhilarating, inclusive and meaningful music across a polarized country that needs to hear it now more than ever.

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  • Excellent LP I am new to the Kennedys would highly recommend
    author: Glenn C

    I am new to the Kennedys and have found this album to be excellent. They have done an excellent jop of covering other peoples tunes. The guitar playing is superb especially on Eight Miles High . Their vocals and harmonies a second to none. Strongly recommended.

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