Chris Thile & Michael Daves - Man in the Middle / Blue Night

When this song started I thought it was just going to be straight bluegrass style pickin', but after 30 seconds or so it turns into some kind of brash country rock insanity. I guess when these guys play live it's more bluegrassy, since there's only two of them on the cover and one's on mandolin and one's on guitar, but this one's totally got "the Jack White treatment". White himself is on drums and production duties and there's a whole posse of other musicians on here as well. It's totally slick and bonkers stuff. Kind of got echoes of CCR or the Flying Burrito Brothers. There's a lot of that twangy yelpy singing that denotes that something is most definitely country, dagnabbit. The press release says that the songs are bluegrass standards but I don't know the first thing about bluegrass really...I guess this is a high-octane update of classic sounds, then. Loads of energy here. Is it bad that it kind of reminds me of when the Soggy Bottom Boys play live at the end of 'O Brother Where Art Thou'? If you think so, you probably don't want this record. It's cheesy as hell but a totally joyous affair. The sense of fun combined with chunky, clear production often makes me think of a faster-paced take on the most recent International Tussler Society LP's polished country rock sound. It's not that clever but it sure is fun.