As a card-carrying member of the Karen Dalton cult, I was pleased to learn that Nashville’s Delmore Recordings has unearthed more of her haunting folk music. Know that her cult includes such lunatics as Bob Dylan, Nick Cave, and Devendra Banhart.
Simply titled 1966, it’s a tape of Dalton and her husband Richard Tucker rehearsing for an upcoming gig in their Summerville, CO., cabin, a place so remote that it had neither running water nor an actual address. For a full rundown on Dalton see my Chronicle feature from 2008, In Her Own Time.
The tapes preserve Dalton in her natural habitat, playing in her living room for herself and the very smallest of audiences, mostly likely just Carl Baron, the man who lugged his reel-to-reel tape up the mountain to her house. He captures Dalton singing several songs from Tim Hardin, including “Reason to Believe” and “Don’t Make Promises,” as well as tunes from Fred Neil, who was a songwriter’s songwriter at the time, if sadly overlooked today. Dalton’s voice has been compared to Billie Holiday’s. Her rendition here of “God Bless the Child” will draw attention, yet it comes across as thrown off and not definitive.
The packaging is lovingly done, with some great pictures of Dalton at home alongside shots of her with Neil and Hardin. Ben Edmonds’ liner notes offer insight into the music and the personalities involved keenly and straightforward, pointing the way to an old weird America that existed just 45 years ago.
This article appears in November 11 • 2011.