January 4 - 11, 1 9 9 6

LEE ROY PARNELL: LUCK AND SKILL

Lee Roy Parnell may not be a household word, but his affecting guitar work can be heard on Trisha Yearwood's Thinking About You and Mary Chapin Carpenter's Shut Up and Kiss Me. And though session men presume to be competent at ballads and rockers, when Parnell's haunting guitar lines decorate a song, you know you're listening to the genuine article -- a man whose music recounts thousands of hours logged in sawdust-covered roadhouses. His virtuosity is no accident. Parnell grew up at the feet of legendary fiddle giant (and family friend) Bob Wills. It was Wills who sparked his interest in Western swing, an interest Parnell celebrates on "A Little Bit of You," the first single from We All Get Lucky Sometimes (Career). Parnell was fortunate to have Wills's estate lend him one of Bob's treasured instruments, and in the hands of James Pennebaker, it comes unnervingly close to the simple beauty of Wills's signature style.

Parnell's heartfelt spiritual connection with his mentor -- and the naked emotion behind that smoky barroom voice -- sets him apart from his "hat act" contemporaries. What makes We All Get Lucky such a welcome treat is the way the whole thing flows, from happy to melancholy to raucous. Note how country merges effortlessly with the blues on "Knock Yourself Out," an amusing little shuffle where Parnell and Pennebaker show off their incredible guitar chops. Parnell socks it to a past lover who's looking for love in all the wrong places when he sings: "Find a cool cowboy with some shiny new boots/See if he can help you get back to your roots."

On "I Had To Let It Go," Parnell acknowledges that he too has been to the dark places yet somehow has managed to avoid the undertow of self-destruction. Stephen Mackey's delicate, poignant bass line anchors Parnell's forays into sex, whiskey, and compulsive gambling. This song could wind up sounding like some pathetic act of contrition, but Parnell tempers it with the wisdom of a man who's been to the well and back. The gospel-tinged ballad "When a Woman Loves a Man" could serve as the flipside to Percy Sledge's '60s classic, told from the woman's point of view: "Sometimes she's caught between the woman that she is/And the one she's expected to be/She's always giving more than she can."

Parnell's ballads never languish in that treacly quagmire that permeates much of contemporary country. In the decidedly roadhouse edge of "If The House Is Rockin', " the freewheeling atmosphere painted by Pennebaker's rollicking melody helps detail the story of a birthday party gone out of bounds. Before long, the place is crashed by a bunch of Hell's Angels "racing their Harleys up and down the hall/Singing `Born To Be Wild' at the top of their lungs." Kevin McKendree's piano comes across as both lighthearted and rowdy; drummer Lynn Williams pounds out a toe-tapping beat you can't help but two-step to.

This is Parnell's first release backed by his touring band, the Hot Links, and their musical chemistry suggests the live feel of an Austin City Limits gig rather than a studio effort. When the CD concludes, with the instrumental "Catwalk" (a collaboration between Parnell and the "King of Conjunto," accordionist Flaco Jimenez), the sheer joy of the jamming melts that imaginary wall between listener and recording like shortening in a hot skillet. Packed with solid songwriting (Parnell wrote the tunes with the likes of Gary Nicholson, Mike Reid, and Will Jennings) and engaging steel and dobro playing, We All Get Lucky Sometimes is one album that really cooks.

-- David Gérard