Marty Stuart – The party may come to an end, but the road goes on forever

“That was something we all agreed on,” Stinson says, “because we were going to cut it live. You know, our favorite records have been the ones that were done live. And it’s all around the singer. And since we were singing leads — I have two or three leads on that record, and Brian has a song — we wanted to be the quartet. And sing. So we set up at Marty’s house, and we were all in the same room, with no headphones. It’s so easy to sing that way, and you go for the performance.”

“This wouldn’t have been the record it is if we had not had time and the camaraderie and all the experience we had working all those places, and trying the music out in front of people,” Vaughan adds. “It would have been a much different experience. Because we were really ready when we went in there. We did the thing in two and a half days — literally — and most of it was done in one day. The first day we didn’t get much. The second day we got everything, and then the last day we did one more song, and that was it. We knew what we wanted, and we were ready for it.”

Listen to the album, and it’s easy to hear what they’re talking about. Like the Sullivan Family, with whom Stuart worked as a child before joining Lester Flatt’s band (Stuart has produced two bluegrass gospel albums by Jerry & Tammy Sullivan since then), the Staples’ repertoire concentrates almost exclusively on the redemptive power of faith. And the songs the band found or wrote to go with the two Pops Staples originals that begin and (almost) close the album are very much in the same vein.

If there seems to be a gap between the kind of grass-roots, anti-corporate populism he expresses in talking about the Electric Barnyard Tour and his adherence to a religion that’s often used to abet corporate power, Stuart has a ready answer.

“I take my cue from the main man — Jesus. He felt the same way. Jesus didn’t hang out with the socialites. My Bible tells me that he hung out with the unlovely. He hung out with the real people — the people of the land, the poor people.

“Good for the church for doing all its numbers. I hope it’s a positive force. But I tend to go where the spirit is found, and that’s the one place in my life where I don’t welcome any pretense whatsoever. You know, the business of the gospel and the gospel are two different things to me. I’m real happy that I don’t have to make a business out of it. I can try to live as best I can — as Cowboy Jack Clement says, I’m a D-plus Christian. But I’m trying.

“I think it’s an unbeatable combination when you have a man or a woman that’s in a position of authority and power that truly has the right stuff in their heart. That can be a good thing for a lot of people. But when that gets confused with politics, when that gets confused with other agendas, it can really get murky real quick. Which always leads me right back to the same place: Boy, I’m glad I’m just a guitar player that writes and sings, and can sing about this, and go off.

“One of the greatest points of communication with God in this world is to sit down at a table and have the words from heaven flow down through a pen — words that become a song. Or to sit down in front of a mandolin, and not know what you’re gonna play, and move a room to tears. I’ve got enough sense to know it ain’t me. It’s called the Holy Spirit. And that’s what’s missing in a lot of places, I think.”

As stunning as Souls’ Chapel is for its blend of heartfelt sentiment and deep grasp of African-American gospel traditions, there’s more to come. Badlands, a set of songs about Native American issues and, in particular, the Lakota Sioux, with whom Stuart has spent time since an early ’80s visit to the Pine Ridge reservation in South Dakota with Johnny Cash, is due in October. It’s being advanced by an engaging episode of CMT’s road diary/biography show “In The Moment,” built around a June concert at the reservation.

And next spring, Superlatone will release yet another Stuart disc, this one documenting a Fabulous Superlatives bluegrass show at the Ryman Auditorium in 2003, with guests Charlie Cushman on banjo and Stuart Duncan on fiddle.

And there are photo books, too — five of them, including a kind of supplement to Badlands and one he calls Blue Line Hotshots. “You know on the old maps, the two-lane roads were in blue, the interstates were in red,” he says, by way of explaining the latter title. “I started noticing, everywhere I played, there was some character, or set of characters, that showed up that had just enough Elvis in them to be hotdogs in their county, but probably more sense than to try to get out and do anything about it.”

Still, he says — and the rest of the Fabulous Superlatives seem to agree — these days, it’s all about the touring.

“There’s a fan base that’s going to drive anything within a 500-mile radius — or more, in some cases,” Brian Glenn says. “They’ve been Marty fans from the beginning. But recently it’s been getting younger, and I don’t exactly know why, because none of his product has really taken things to a new hip factor. And what I’m looking forward to, and what I think what Marty would ultimately like to see, would be to see a new influx of young college-age kids kind of getting into his music again. And I think all three of these albums have the potential to make that happen.”

If it happens, Stuart will know why. “Every single thing that I’m up to right now is the product of being on the back roads for the past three summers,” he concludes. “And now we’re on the edge of that cornfield, and headed toward something else.”

ND contributing editor Jon Weisberger is a father, touring bass player, songwriter, and music critic who now calls Nashville home. When he’s there.