Graveyard Train Delivers The Goods

Posted on May 12, 2014 in Album Reviews

Read our review of ‘Takes One To Know One’ by Graveyard Train

Graveyard Train

Takes One To Know One

Album and Tour

In brevity there is beauty.

A year ago Graveyard Train was spinning out of control. Over a few short years they’d morphed from a bunch of mates getting drunk and playing small dive bars to a band trying to maintain some semblance of the professionalism needed to play international festivals and headline major theatres.

The 2012 album Hollow garnered some serious, positive attention. The lead single “I’m Gone” was the second Most Played Song on Australian community radio in 2012 and the #1 Most Played Song on stations 3RRR, PBS and 4ZZZ. This was all close on the heels of a stellar run of festival dates including the globally celebrated MONA FOMA (“My favourite Australian band”, said festival curator Brian Ritchie, Violet Femmes), local legend Meredith Music Festival, (“Easily a highlight,” said Noise11), Woodford Folk Festival, Darwin Festival, Adelaide Festival, and Canada’s Hillside and Vancouver Folk festivals.

Everybody loved them but, away from the huge crowds and radio support, Graveyard Train struggled to keep the wheels on and ended with band members AWOL on benders and angry words spoken. Graveyard Train was idling at the station.

Then someone wrote a song and Graveyard Train reconvened to inhabit a studio space. More songs came, quickly, and they walked away from the desk with this new record — Takes One To Know One — and the renewed realisation that, when they were writing, recording and putting on some of the finest live shows around, they were unstoppable.

That reinforcement is tattooed on the record opener, lead single and title track, “Takes One To Know One” – the first inkling you’ll get as to what power this band harnesses in song. It starts with a simple beat and chant …’takes one to know one, two, three, four…and grows with a precise, rockabilly groove. “Close The Book” has a catchy hook and a deliberate, chain gang chorus while “The Parasite” is quieter, a tender love song (at least on the surface) which is almost over before it gets started.

A Morricone-infused vibe commences “The Creep” with its pattern of stark but highly effective instrumentation, seemingly dark lyrics and lamenting tone (not lamentable). The build up as the track progresses is infectious and enthralling, a banjo providing the pulling power. This is a standout song. More banjo infuses “She Likes To Eat The Skin” so as ‘to fall in love with angels of the morning’ with a Morricone-like reprise. The vibe gets rockier and ominous with “The Chrysalid” (another name for a chrysalis) and again a groove emerges which is irresistible, the electric guitar and drums in control of the song’s direction until it ends in a wall of silence.

“The Widow” completes proceedings, a more alt. country affair, with nice slide guitar (and eventually harmonica) providing a contrast to what has preceded it. At 2 minutes 40 the track is done and, at a fraction shy of 22 minutes, so is the album. But do not be deterred by this – this is a terrific, lean album with nothing extraneous or bloated.

Repeated listens of the entire LP reveals gems and oddities buried in a sublime, sometimes tortured marriage of country music, stoner rock, classic Graveyard gang vocals, haunting storytelling and the stellar musicianship that dyed-in-the-wool fans of the band know to expect. The album was recorded by Paul Maybury at A Secret Location Sound Recorders.

With its new record, and its own label (Black Hat Rackets), Graveyard Train has — in conjunction with Aus/NZ distribution via MGM — paired up with revered European label Cargo Records to release the new record to a worldwide audience ahead of a national run of dates, dovetailing into a month-long European tour across July and August.

Takes One To Know One – enjoy the beauty and brevity.