Jim Choukas Bradley Black Hills Ranger
Jim Choukas-Bradley has quietly released a new album of folk based songs rich with landscapes, storytelling, and a well of human experiences Black Hills Ranger.
The album opens with the title track and a song about never going home again. Some of us hit the road at some point in our youth or young adulthood, forging our own pathway. The song explores the feeling in those moments – exhilaration, anticipation, pangs of sweet sorrow. The guitar sounds are bright and the harmony vocals add nostalgia as the piece bounces. Both of Jim’s grandfathers were born in the Black Hills, and this song serves as an homage to them in spirit as well.
“Way Down in Dixie Land” again celebrates the concept of continuing to keep moving, traveling by train and their are elements of The Band in the style, but it’s folk rock, and the story just unfolds about sleeping with your memories and waiting for someone to roll on down the tracks to him. “Wind So Still” brings things down to a hush with bits of pedal steel-like sounds and full-bodied harmonica and it’s a still black night under the twinkling starlight.
“Rolling In On Number 9” is organ-based and feels a little like a long-lost Neil Young song, as it flows into just the right sounding chorus. Jim’s vocals do resemble Neil Young’s in places throughout the collection.
“Lazuli” is a co-write with Jim’s wife Melanie, and is a crowd singalong with an easy pace: “The Lazuli bird turns feathers to the earth and sky, blue above and red on breast, colors that don’t die… be mine forever as the lazuli sing, hold me like the river flows, and all the love it brings.” Pretty.
“Mingo Road” follows, loosely, a rhythm pattern that sounds a little like the Dead’ “Sugar Magnolia” but stays on more of a dance beat, and is just a cool love song. Jim Choukas-Bradley delivers shades of some of the best of Americana, folk style music in a way that sometimes feels familiar already, performing in relatable way that are never derivative.
Later in the album “Heaven Bound” is layers of strings and vocals that are lovingly and spiritually expressed.
Lyrically this whole album is rich and just plain good.
Jim Choukas-Bradley is a family man with a deep rooted context. He’s also traveled to all 50 states, and was raised and is settled in northeastern areas: Washington DC, Vermont, Connecticut. Travel inevitably provides experiences and perspective shifts, and Jim’s life of travel is evidenced in the rich landscapes of the songs all throughout the album.
More information is available here on his website: https://www.jimchoukasbradley.com/
Musicians on the album are Jim Choukas Bradley on vocals, piano, organ and acoustic guitars, Jesse Choukas-Bradley on rhythm and lead guitar and vocals; Caleb Hoffman and Hans Seegers on drums; Jesse Daumit on rhythm & lead guitar; Jesse Choukas-Bradley on rhythm and lead guitar and vocals; Morgan Choukas-Bradley on backing vocals; Melanie Choukas-Bradley on backing vocals; Jeff Reed on bass; and Kim Tidman on background vocals.
Black Hills Ranger was produced and mixed by Bobby Knepper at The Waiting Room in Nashville, and mastered by Harrison Tate at The Hit Lab in Nashville.