If you have ever trekked across the expansive landscape of a national park and wondered what music might be suitable on your headphones, then ponder no longer. For a most-original concept collection of songs, The National Park Album, will not only glide you through utopia, but broaden the mind.
As the title suggests, The National Park Album is a unique collection of 15 songs dedicated to – and telling the fascinating tales of - America’s stunning national parks. And to give it grunt, the album is headlined by Ry Cooder - a multi-genre music legend.
There are 63 national parks stretching across 30 states and even to the territories of American Samoa and the U.S. Virgin Islands. All national parks are congressionally designated protected areas and range from such wonders of the world like the Grand Canyon and Yellowstone to the more obscure like the Acadia National Park, along the mid-section of coastal Maine, and the aptly-named Zion, a unique national park in southwest Utah.
It is such parks which feature in the album, a fascinating musical narrative which not only explores the natural beauty of the protected landscapes but endeavors to explore and interpret in song myths and legends of the individual parks.
The project was masterminded by the Swedish-American writer Fredrik Colting who wanted to create a unique musical tribute to the natural environment.
“I’ve learned that the U.S. national parks are not just nature-captured wild, they are as much feelings and stories which span generations,” he told Crossroads. “I thought how cool to have original songs that represent each park, recorded by artists who spend time in the parks, and enjoyed by all who venture there.
Colting wrote all but two songs – Ry Cooder’s “Lava Beds” and “Congaree” by Animal Collective. He told Crossroads it was a collaborative, though somewhat unusual process: “I first wrote the songs and provided melody and cues. Then I passed the baton to the artists to record something great that represents the parks, and themselves as artists.
So how did such a big name as Ry Cooder get involved?
“Short answer: we asked!” Colting said. “Personally, I’ve been a big fan of Ry’s music for a long time and reached out to his management. Granted, it was a long shot, and asking a legendary artist for their time, focus and creativity. Luckily, Ry thought the project worthwhile, and I think it’s a testament to the essence of this record: nature, and our national parks, bring us together.”
Being a writer, it is no surprise that Colting’s project has literary connotations. The funky opening track, “America’s Best Idea” featuring Texan David Karsten Daniels, provides something of a forward to the album, while the following 14 songs can be considered chapters as they are stories pertaining to individual parks.
Of particular fascination are the musical plots Colting has devised to be specifically applicable to individual parks.
Perhaps the most imaginative is “Lady Bird” by Nashville-based Stefanie Joyce. It tells of 19th century English explorer Lady Isabella Bird who ended up in the Colorado Rocky Mountains, where she met, and fell in love with, a legendary one-eyed outlaw “Rocky Mountain Jim” Nugent. The legend goes he wowed her with his poetry but she would later leave the Rockies and her “dear desperado.” Less than a year later, “Rocky Mountain Jim” would be shot dead.
When I heard that he’d been shot down
I can’t say I was surprised
Free and untamed living never comes without a price
But I smile when I think about on that mountain ledge
The Sky of Colorado stretching wild above our heads
The stories get more fascinating, if a little sombre, on “God’s Land” with Allison Preisinger who pays a some-what sad homage to the Olympic National Park in her home state of Washington. She collaborated with Colting to sing of the perils of the wilderness in the national parks and, in particular, “God’s Land” details mysterious disappearances in Olympic Park over the years:
A place where life and death are at odds
It welcomes you to the land of the Gods
A rather macabre twist to the song came when, as part of the album promotion, Preisinger related how her relatives had drowned within the Olympic National Park in the 1950’s when their car crashed into Lake Crescent, west of Port Angeles.
But there is a happy ending to “37 Days in Wonderland” by Americana artist Jeff Kightly who sings - with nice rhythmic backing - about a tale from 1870 when the first presidential expedition was sent to explore “Wonderland” as California’s Yellowstone National Park was known. Among the explorers was one Truman Everts who found himself suddenly lost.
Then Truman turned around and found
His friends and horse had long gone
All alone in the wilderness
All he had been lost
As he wandered in wonderland
The good news is that Truman was found alive after 37 days. He survived largely on thistle plants and today the “Everts Thistle” bears his name.
This story-telling theme means the album falls somewhat into the contemporary folkie category. But it diverts sharply into experimental pop with the first of the two non-Colting collaborations, “Congaree” by Animal Collective. The Baltimore rockers take an electronic-boom approach to their imaginative celebration of the high forest canopies within South Carolina’s Congaree National Park.
And the actual tallest tree in the world, the Hyperion, a coast redwood in California’s Redwood National Parks, gets the first person treatment in an appealing, reverb-driven track “Hyperion” by James Worton:
I have seen it all
Not just because I’m tall
I’m the oldest living thing
Now hear the words I say
There is no better way to explore the Great Smokey Mountains National Park than assign the task to Rising Appalachia. Playing music inspired by the Appalachian culture is of course stock-in-trade for this highly-regarded southern folk ensemble led by sisters Leah Song and Chloe Smith. And they soon hit their mark on “The Wisdom of the Smoke” with beautiful harmonies to match the beauty of the environment they portray through the ancestors of the Cherokee people from these southern mountains:
To this day we hear their laughter
Unmistaken joy hereafter
Rising Appalachia’s contribution to this album coincides with the release of their latest album, Folk & Anchor, a refreshingly unique take on cover songs from big names like Bob Dylan and Beyonce.
The melodic, harmonizing vocals achieved by Rising Appalachia are matched by Canadian indie artist Jessica Allossery on “The Edge of the Sea,” her very-appealing tribute to the Arcadia National Park. And her catchy chorus invokes haunting images of Maine’s Cadillac Mountain, the tallest mountain on America’s Atlantic Coast.
Cadillac Mountain seeing the sun rise
The first to first to light the darkness in the sky
The first to first to light the darkness in the sky
The first to make this whole place come alive
The National Park Album ends, as might be expected with the biggest name, Ry Cooder and his own composition “Lava Beds,” which is dedicated to the Lava Beds National Monument in north-eastern California, a park of geological significance as it is dotted with lava tubes formed by flowing lava from a volcanic vent. Cooder endearingly explores the need to retreat to a rugged landscape:
I need a place to clear my head
I’m going down in Lava Beds
No freeways there, no burger stops
No prison walls, no shopping malls
Just a moon above and the desert ground
You feel brand new in the peace you found
Cooder’s tempo is soft and slow and uses backing vocals and soothing strings to serenade the song to an wistful end - la la la lava tubes, la la la lava tubes
What makes this album particularly appealing is that Colting and his artists have all agreed that 100 per cent of The National Park Album sales will go to support U.S. National Parks.
The final thoughts should go to Colting himself: “Two things that unite us as humans are our love for music and nature. I wanted to be part of creating an album that celebrated this connection in a time when we should be reminded of what unites us, rather what divides us.”
Soothing words – and music – in this U.S. election year.
Paul Cutler
Editor Crossroads – Americana Music Appreciation
Comments