The Weary Boys
Were this 1946 instead of 2001, flour companies throughout the South would have beseiged the Weary Boys with offers for radio programs and promotional tours. They might have even helped elect a governor. True, MTV ain’t exactly beating a path to the holler nowadays — certainly not to that Red River holler known as Beerland — but a few more albums like this 30-minute, 12-song firecracker, and they might be. Unlike BR5-49 or Split Lip Rayfield, Austin’s Wearies fervently ply their grandfathers’ music without a trace of smug retro irony — like they really do rehearse barefoot in the back of an International Harvester, not in the garage getting high and listening to Flatt & Scruggs. It’s the vocal harmonies that give them away, lending a familial, otherworldly resonance to Bill Monroe’s “Dark as the Night.” Equally strong are their instrumental chops, relentless on “Clinch Mountain Backstep” and properly reverent on “Rock of Ages” (special shout-out to fiddler Brian Salvi). As a matter of fact, lead guitarist Mario Matteoli’s originals (“Lose One More Baby,” “Pick Up the Steam”) nestle among songs simply credited “Trad.” — including a barn-burning “Freight Train Blues” — with no appreciable interruption of continuity, lyrically or musically. Perhaps it’s time we had a second look at those birth certificates, o Weary “Boys.”
This article appears in October 19 • 2001.