Sara Watkins was 8 when she started playing the violin with her brother and other members of the Thile family in California. After 18 years, a slew of Grammy Awards and five albums, Nickel Creek called it a day in 2007 with their Farewell (For Now) tour. With her second release since Nickel Creek were mothballed, Sara Watkins has joined up with the one of the ringleaders of the new California folk sound.
She has also brought the family along with her brother Sean on guitar and as most know he was in Nickel Creek too.
Sara Watkins has a sweet, high vocal style that works well with the people she has gathered around the microphone with. Jackson Browne and Taylor Goldsmith bring that harmony out in the cover of Willie Nelson’s “I’m A Memory”. Bright and upbeat, Sara’s string playing is high in the mix and the addition of The Heartbreakers’ Benmont Tench on keys makes this a Hollywood gathering of the highest order. While Watkins’ brother Sean, also formerly of Nickel Creek, is brought along on guitar.
It is not only the guest vocals that make this a sweet record but the strings and production and vocals of Blake Mills give the songs a homemade, yet high quality feel.“The Ward Accord” written by the pair, is a splendid instrumental which shows off the virtuosity of these two young pickers.
This is not a bluegrass record. This is just high quality playing of folk that you probably won’t hear on any country radio station.
The cover of Dan Wilson’s “When It Pleases You” makes you think of Jenny Lewis when you hear it and fits the scheme of this compilation. This is a record that should sit on the best of the year list so far. It takes you up, away, down and back around again.
“Take Up Your Spade” has a choir of Sara, Jackson, Fiona Apple and whomever else was in the studio; and it is the one song that Wakins (and others) may be singing for some time. It is an optimistically bright end to the brilliant Sun Midnight Sun.
– Paul Busch
