Album Review: Sturgill Simpson, Cuttin' Grass - Vol. 1

Is “fan-friggin-tastic” too genial a way to describe this unapologetically sprawling, unabashedly bluegrass double-album (!) from the redoubtable Sturgill Simpson? A “reimagining” of various songs from his own catalogue, apparently conceived while the ace musician/actor was recovering from Coronavirus, and cut with a crack cohort of Nashville brass well-versed in the Bill Monroe Playbook.

“I had it in my mind for a long time that someday I want to cut as many of these songs as possible in this fashion, just organic and stripped down to the raw bones of the composition,” Simpson is quoted as saying in a press release for the album. “If you can’t sit down and play a song like that, it’s probably a pretty shitty song.”

Indeed. Without a whisker of doubt or a moment of pause, Simpson charges with earth-shattering abandon into these Kentucky-blue waters, swimming in fiddles and banjos, creating what scans essentially as a honky-tonk come to life in your living room. Which seems about right given the times.

As might be expected, heartache, happiness, and humour vie for thematic dominance, and each are well represented. Cases in point: “Life Ain’t Fair and the World Is Mean” (originally from 2013's High Top Mountain) cheekily chronicles what most of us spend our 20s painfully discovering.

The aching “I Don’t Mind” (the lead single and an unreleased fan favourite) tears itself asunder for a love gone south. And “Turtles All the Way Down” (from 2014's Metamodern Sounds in Country Music) is recut as an exuberant existential rumination on god, the devil, drugs and…uh… one’s own perspective? Let’s go with that.

Throughout, Simpson and crew avoid the same-y-ness that can plague such genre-pure albums, especially one boasting 20 songs. This crew leaves the fatigue for lesser hands. Judging by the title, this is envisioned as an ongoing project for the prolific and highly acclaimed artist. Count us in!

Cuttin' Grass - Vol. 1 (Butcher Shoppe Sessions) was released digitally October 15, 2020 on High Top Mountain Records via Thirty Tigers/The Orchard.
Listen to it here.