Ruby Dee And The Snakehandlers
North Of Bakersfield
Dionysus ID1233131 (2006)
Dirty Linen #132 (October/November ’07)
He played rockabilly until the wee morning hours; she wailed country until the cows came home. Eventually their paths crossed when Ruby Dee Philippa accosted guitar slinger Jorge Harada and boldly announced, “You’re my next guitar player,” and Ruby Dee and the Snakehandlers was hatched. Since then, they’ve steadily been on the rise in their adopted Pacific Northwest and have finally delivered their full-length debut, on which highoctane rockabilly meets fall-off-your- barstool 50s honky-tonk, hard-drivin’ Bakersfield country, and Western swing. There’s never a style you can pinpoint and say, “Oh there’s the Buck Owens riff” or “There’s the rippin’ rockabilly riff,” mainly because they blend it all so well based on the song’s sentiment. Though Ruby may sound as if she’s from the Oklahoma oil fields or the hot west Texas plains, she really hails from “Northern Central Eastern California” near the Nevada state line, where it’s still rural enough to have a hardscrabble drawl. That alone gives her lyrics a slightly seductive edge, whether she’s singing about one o f h e r m a n y romantic tribulations or the occasional love that’s gone right. The emotional content is enough to keep you hanging on while Harada and guest pedal-steel guitarist Grant Johnson blaze faster and hotter than an out-of-control prairie fire. A sonic shoot-out, to say the least. (DW)
