Quite simply, this is the best Lui Collins recording, ever.
Lahri Bond, Dirty Linen, October 2000
writing about Leaving Fort Knox by Lui Collins
LUI COLLINS Leaving Fort Knox (Molly Gamblin' Music)
: Lui Collins has played plenty of old-time music and it's rubbing off. Many of the "new" songs on her latest album sound like they were drawn from a traditional well. "Spark/Wings" evokes deep-woods Appalachia, with Collins flailing away on banjo, Dana Robinson on mandolin and Pete Sutherland on fiddle. Ditto her Carter Family homage, "Won't Miss You Darling." But what makes this such a fine album is the way Collins sets contemporary themes to time-tested musical styles. Quite a few songs center on themes of severing a poisoned relationship or searching for a meaningful one. In the album's most daring moment, Collins juxtaposes "Rarest Rose," with its repeated sing-along folk-style chorus, and the darker title track, replete with edgy accordion, thick bass and dense percussion. This is a thoughtful album that is comforting one moment and challenging the next. (Four Stars)
-- Rob Weir
Copyright © 2000 by Robert Weir. All rights reserved.
Used with permission.
Lui Collins' new CD, Leaving Fort Knox, arrived just before Rob Weir's wonderful review ran in the August 3, 2000, issue of the Western Massachusetts Valley Advocate. Weir's notice has the twin advantages of being thorough and concise, and I reprint it here with his kind permission.
Lui Collins fans may not all know about her performances on the compilation, The Songs of Elmer Hawkes (CD, Guayaquil, 1995). Her singing is excellent on "Pull Away Slowly from the Old Place" and "The Man Who Built Carnegie Hall." Her vocal on "Wild Winds on the County Line" is worth the entire price of the album.
-- Alan Lewis
Photograph © copyright 1984 by Susan Wilson.
All rights reserved. Used with permission.
SUSAN WILSON'S LOVELY PHOTOGRAPH of Lui Collins, shown here on the cover of the September 1984 issue of the Black Sheep Review, is the best likeness of the singer that I have ever seen; and we are pleased that Wilson has given us permission to post it here. Her four-page article about Lui Collins appears in the same issue. You may contact Susan Wilson at her Camera Work Studio via www.susanwilsonphoto.com.
Steve Morse, in the May 7, 1982, issue of the Boston Globe, called Lui Collins an "openhearted, contemporary folksinger whose songs often have a New England focus. She has been one of the bright lights in folk this year...."
She's a cheerfully high-spirited, long-haired, 34-year-old gamin with a lovely folk soprano.
-- Jeff McLaughlin, Boston Globe, March 5, 1985
Her warmly romantic love songs and inspiring humanistic ballads, delivered with a lilting musicality, ... are enormously appealing.
-- Scott Alarik, Boston Globe, January 20, 1994
THE NEW ENGLAND-BASED COLLINS has been crafting songs since the late 70s and has always had an honest quality to her music. Here she finds the perfect balance of lyrics that focus unflinchingly on the joys and losses of love as well as the triumph of the spirit. Her gorgeously poetic lyrics are wrapped around a solid bed of traditional- and old-timey-influenced music, which is at once simple and perfect for conveying the mood and subtleties of her words.
Lahri Bond, Dirty Linen, October 2000
writing about Leaving Fort Knox by Lui Collins
Contact
Website: www.luicollins.com
E-mail:
mollygee@luicollins.com
Notes copyright © 2000 by Alan Lewis.
All rights reserved.
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