Chris Sharp is almost certainly the only member of the Tipton Hill Boys likely to be familiar to those outside of the Asheville, North Carolina, area — at least for now. Onetime guitarist for the late John Hartford, he’s the guy in the Down From The Mountain film who replies to T Bone Burnett’s request to play with more “rock ‘n’ roll” energy by complaining that he doesn’t know what that means. And, indeed, there’s not a trace of rock ‘n’ roll to be found on Lucky.
Don’t let that fool you, though. The energy here isn’t that of narrowly-conceived traditional bluegrass; instead, the dominant flavor is of 1960s Nashville bluegrass, when combining tight three-part harmonies, banjo, fiddle, acoustic guitar and bass with drums, pedal steel and/or piano was a winning approach for Flatt & Scruggs, the Osborne Brothers and others. Given Sharp’s fondness for Lester Flatt’s thumb-picked guitar stylings and genial vocals, it’s a smart approach, and the group carries it off with abundant skill and a good-humored vibe, abetted by guests including fiddlers Shad Cobb and Matt Combs of the Mike Snider Band and the mysterious “steel ghost.”
From Flatt & Scruggs’ “Steamboat Whistle Blues” and “Hot Corn Cold Corn” to the old Warner Mack tune “Bridge Washed Out”, Benny Martin’s hilariously nostalgic “We All Smell Good”, a pair of Osborne Brothers favorites, and a couple of deft originals, Lucky is a well-constructed, affectionate exercise in re-creating — with a new twist or two — an all-too-neglected current in the historical bluegrass stream.
