"Western Wall: The Tucson Sessions" by LINDA RONSTADT and EMMYLOU HARRIS (August 1999 Duet CD Album on Asylum Records 7559 62408-2) - A Review by Mark Barry...

 

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"...All I Left Behind..."

 

Gorgeous song choices (covers and originals) - beautiful production values and a strangely uplifting languid flavour running through it all. 1999's "Western Wall: The Tucson Sessions" by Linda Ronstadt and Emmylou Harris on Asylum 7559-62408-2 (Barcode 075596240825) is a 13-Track winner (50:49 minutes total play time). 

 

Multi-instrumentalists Ethan Johns and Greg Leisz make up the core of the band, and I can't stress enough just how gorgeous the audio is (the famous and much-experienced Glyn Johns did the Production). The album title song is a Rosanna Cash tune - "Western Wall".

 

Guest spots include - Amen Corner's Andy Fairweather-Lowe playing Bass and Electric Guitar on the cool sinister opener "Loving The Highwayman", Bernie Leadon of The Eagles is on the brilliant "Raise The Dead" (an Emmylou original) while Jackson Browne's masterpiece "For A Dancer" from his 1974 album "Late For The Sky" gets a makeover here with both Bernie Leadon and Neil Young Harmonizing and playing Harmonica.

 

The haunting "1917" has Kate & Anna McGarrigle and Bernie Leadon while Paul Kennerley plays Lead Guitar on his own "He Was Mine". Leonard Cohen's "Sisters Of Mercy" has three - Bernie Leadon, Andy Fairweather-Lowe and the McGarrigle sisters. And on it goes to the final song, a cover of Springsteen's "Across The Border" with Neil Young, Andy Fairweather-Lowe and Leadon in attendance.

 

The first two are obvious winners, but it's gems like their cover of Patty Griffin's "Falling Down" with its huge shimmering electric guitar rattling across your speakers and Bruce's better-half Patti Scialfa sees her carnival town tale of "Valerie" get done with Emmylou on Lead Vocals. There is a fantastic and surprising choice in Sinead O'Connor's gorgeous and moving ballad "This Is To Mother You" that first appeared on her stunning 4-Track "Gospel Oak EP" in 1997 on Chrysalis Records – two years before this album appeared. Almost like a hypnotic hymn of sorts, "This Is To Mother You" is done here with the two voices harmonizing on every line like some beautiful secular church-like rendition (Sinead would love this).

 

And across it all is their sublime voices - swirling and caressing good songs. A forgotten sweetheart of an album and one that grows and grows on you, like all the best sets do...