Murry Hammond likes to whistle. A lot. With his sophomore solo outing, the longtime second banana to Rhett Miller in Old 97’s shows the world he can put his lips together and blow with the best of them on every single song, sometimes dispensing with lyrics altogether. However, unless you hate the act of whistling as a matter of principle, this turns out to be ok, surprisingly. After a few tracks, the whistling on Trail Songs starts to feel as natural as this gentle troubadour’s steady acoustic guitar, just another element of a melancholy suite that could be the soundtrack to an especially haunting dream.
Never straining to impress, Hammond embodies understatement. His singing is wistful and the calm band is impressively tight. In addition to Hammond (guitar, bass, Mellotron), the lineup includes just Richard Hewett (drums), Annie Crawford (piano, Mellotron, Farfisa, harmonium), and Faith Shippey, whose bowed upright bass adds a subtle power to the sound. In its own crafty way, Trail Songs is as insistent as a much louder album.
