The story goes that on the day Vic Chesnutt recorded the song "Guilty By Association" for his 1995 album Is The Actor Happy?, he asked his pal Michael Stipe to stop by the studio to add backing vocals. The song tells the tale of a struggling artist obscured by the shadow of his famous friend ("You've been canonized, and I've been fried / Guilty by association"). Supposedly, Stipe helped out without knowing what the song was about. Meet Vic Chesnutt -- clever, original and a bit subversive.
Chesnutt is a true outsider artist in the best Southern tradition. His unique vocal phrasings, creative vocabulary and somewhat wacked-out visions are hardly the average singer-songwriter fare. So a tribute record with other artists trying their hand at Chesnutt's idiosyncratic material is destined to be hit-and-miss affair. Still, most contributions on Sweet Relief II (a sequel to the Victoria Williams tribute album released in 1993) pull it off.
Joe Henry slyly piles another layer of irony on top of "Guilty by Association" by enlisting his sister-in-law Madonna on eloquently understated background vocals. The unlikely pairing proves a perfect choice to deliver the sad lament of the overshadowed artist and a wry observation about society's fixation on the famous: "All the little loonies / With a salient obsession / Come out from the boonies / With their sharpies and their guns / Loaded with questions."
Some of the best cuts here come from unlikely sources. Garbage's album-opening rendition of "Kick My Ass"does just that -- it's a mesmerizing, soaring version that makes me think I should give that band a closer listen. And Live turns in a stunningly beautiful take on "Supernatural".
Not everything here works. Sparklehorse's entry, "West of Rome", is a droning bore. And the collaboration between Smashing Pumpkins and Red Red Meat on "Sad Peter Pan" dumps the fragile beauty of the original for a brooding darkness that seems at odds with the tender lyric: "I'm a reluctant rebel / I just want to be Aaron Neville / With a crown on my head / And my denim shirt all soaked with sweat."
Most of the arrangements are much more dense than Chesnutt's stark, folky originals. R.E.M. delivers a passionate, feedback-fueled interpretation of "Sponge"; the full-tilt rock approach lends depth to the song. Soul Asylum's winning take on "When I Ran Off and Left Her" is the best thing they've done since "Summer of Drugs" on the first Sweet Relief record. Cracker's fine version of "Withering" features some especially tasty spaghetti-western guitar from Johnny Hickman.
If you're unfamiliar with Chesnutt's work, this collection of 13 covers (plus an album-closing duet by Chesnutt and Williams) is an easy introduction to one of the finest songwriters of his day. It also benefits a worthy cause -- the Sweet Relief Musician's Fund, which helps musicians pay for medical treatment (Chesnutt himself is partially paralyzed from a teenage car accident). If you want more, seek out any of Chesnutt's four albums on Texas Hotel Records, as his achingly beautiful songs also deserve to be heard in their original voice.
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