4.10.2007

Tube :: dawn Landes and The WST Bluegrass Band :: Young Folks

I think everyone and their brother has blogged about this video, but just in case you, dear IndieRocketeer, don't read everyone and their brother's blog, here it is. New York-based bluegrass darling dawn Landes (don't ask me why she lowercases the 'D') is a recording engineer during the day, working with folks like Philip Glass, Ryan Adams, and Joseph Arthur. She also recently released her first full-length album Firebrand. (Available for purchase here.)

The impetus for the video in question was when dawn met The WST Bluegrass Band (We Sorta Tried) in Austin and asked them to be her backing band. In one of those brilliant how-did-I-not-think-of-this-first moves, she got them to record a cover of Peter, Bjorn & John's 'Young Folks' which I named as one of my favorite songs of last year. The song works on so many levels. Not only is it one of those rare covers where the band makes the song their own, but it also switches the male-female parts, which I've always been a big fan of (my favorite being Future Bible Heroes version of Human League's 'Don't You Want Me, Baby'). And then there's the fact that the youngest member of The WST Bluegrass Band is 67, giving whole new meaning to the line 'We don't care about the young folks.' The video itself isn't that great - the highlights being just how darn cute dawn is next to these old men, the low point being the cheap lighting and production values. But it's all worth it just to hear this amazing rendition of a new pop classic. Head to dawn's website and download some of her other stuff. It's all quite good.

1 comment:

Rich said...

The guitar player is Don Lilljedahl...my dad. I was overseas at the time of the recording, but when I got back and he showed me the video I was really blown away. I mean, I've never even heard the original version but when I did it made me appreciate the hard work dawn put in as well as my dad and his band. The song, both versions, are fantastic! BTW...my dad is going on 77 in a couple of months and he and WST Bluegrass Band are still going strong...he tells me, "I just love to play and entertain folks with good ole' bluegrass music."