Rust Belt refugee Rita Bliss first picked up the banjo in her mid-20s and didn’t begin to seriously pursue a music career until her late 30s. Don’t hold either against her. Peaches and Apple Pies, her debut album, is a vibrant journey that finds her “Driving to Kentucky,” treading time in the East Texas town of Lufkin, downing drinks at the cramped “Best Bar in Texas,” no doubt located in her adopted hometown of Austin, and celebrating the highs and lows that only love, loss and life can induce.
In short, she reminds me of Lui Collins and other singer-songwriters I discovered via the Fast Folk Musical Magazine compilations in the mid-1980s, when I deejayed a folk music show on Penn State’s college radio station. While her songs are bluegrass in flavor, they’re folk in form, and—most importantly—reflect the lessons and experiences of and from a life lived and not imagined. She has a knack for setting scenes and populating them with believable characters, including herself, and possesses a way of turning a phrase that resonates beyond the track in question. (Small wonder that she cites John Prine and Nanci Griffith among her influences.) “Two Dollar Bill,” about an unrequited love, is a good example.
The title track is another gem. It finds her celebrating the object of her affection—presumably her wife: “I’ll bring you flowers and run my fingers through your hair/I’ll sing you love songs to fill up all the air/I’ll let you see behind my eyes/It’ll be all peaches and apple pies.” It’s accented by a flirty dance between fiddle and harmonica that’s as sweet as the lyrics. The upbeat “Love From Lufkin,” for its part, is a captivating postcard to her beloved from a few hundred miles away. “Darlin’, Darlin’,” on the other hand, is a tender tune that transforms from a sweet lullaby to a dying declaration.
The final track, “Goodbye,” looks back at the girl that she was and the places she once called home; but rather than longing for that time, a la Carole King’s “Goin’ Back,” she bids it adieu. The song should resonate not just with the middle-aged (and older) who walk among us, but all who’ve left their formative years (and all the good and bad in them) behind: “These days I feel I’m doing all right/I keep some things out of mind, out of sight/Away in a dark little corner of mine/Are all of the broken, unspoken goodbyes.”
The album, which I heartily recommend, was produced by Dom Fisher of the Grammy-nominated bluegrass band Wood & Wire; he also plays bass and mandolin. The studio band is rounded out by Noah Jeffries, who handles guitar and fiddle; Patrick Herzfeld, who keeps the beat on drums; and Jimmie Scott Calhoun, who provides backing vocals. Bliss’s banjo drives the songs, of course, but she also adds a folky harmonica to some tracks.
The track list:
The Old Grey Cat 