when sturgill had to cut his ‘sound and fury’ tour short due to the pandemic, he retreated back to his home and ruminated on his next step. he did a fundraiser for musicians in june to an empty ryman auditorium with a bluegrass band, and made a promise to his fans that if they raised enough money, he would record a new album. well, he kept his promise, and the setting in retrospect was omniscient.

because nearly everyone stopped touring, he was able to gather up some of the best bluegrass minds around, and get them all in a studio to revisit 20 songs from his catalog. you could be suspicious and think that this was going to be a throw away ‘picking with sturgill’, but you would be wrong. you see, sturgill got started in the music business as a bluegrass artist, and only turned to country and americana formats later in his career. in a recent interview i heard he did with elizabeth cook, he said that after going through these sessions, he realized that many of these songs were at their heart bluegrass in nature, but were molded to fit the genre he was working in at the time. i knew most of these songs already, but they sound so natural in these new settings that he may be completely right.

let us first start off with the musicians he worked with. maybe first and foremost is the incredibly talented sierra hull, who kills it on mandolin here, and also does some great backing vocals. tim o’brien and mark howard are on guitars trading rhythm and leads, scott vestal is on banjo, and stuart duncan is on bass. his longtime bandmate miles miller is on the drums. it was recorded at butcher shoppe studios, unfortunately the last session ever done there.

the band and sturgill sound like they have been playing together forever. sturgill’s vocal stylings are not what you would consider to be in the bluegrass tradition, but it works so well here. on top of that, his often metaphysical lyrics sound better and more profound in this setting. it really just gels and sounds like it should have always been this way.

if you like sturgill or you like bluegrass, either way you will want to add this to your collection. i just found out that he released volume two this weekend, and i have heard a handful of cuts off of that. you might as well get both.