Send "Malcolm Holcombe " Ringtones to your Cell 
| Popmatters |
 Plenty of singers sound like they’ve followed a lifelong regimen of whiskey and cigarettes, but sometimes you wonder if they aren’t putting on a bit of an act. Not so with Malcolm Holcombe. By the time he’s done singing, growling, and rasping his way through a song, you can just tell: that voice isn’t merely lived in; it might have even been to the edge. His own bio even goes so far as to mention the belief among fans that they’d soon be talking about Holcombe in the past tense. Luckily, that hasn’t been the case. Holcombe’s traveled a long road since his debut record was inexplicably shelved by Geffen Records, releasing eight (as of To Drink the Rain) increasingly accomplished albums.Whatever demons Holcombe’s fought over the years, though, he seems to be past them now. Perhaps as a result, To Drink the Rain might be the most upbeat record of Holcombe’s career. He’s still intense—even shuffling album opener “One Leg At a Time”, with its gritty homespun humor, sounds like hard-won wisdom. “Mountains of Home” is wistful, tender, and emotional. At first blush, Holcombe still seems like a force of nature, but not the singer who always sounded like he was on the verge of crushing his acoustic guitar in his hands as he played. It’s not long, though, before he’s growling through the protest song “Behind the Number One” (“There’s a land o’ milk and honey / Full o’ lawsuits left and right / Keeps me jumpin’ in the water / Drownin’ demons in the night”), and the title track is one of Holcombe’s finest examples of his gutbucket blues style to date. To Drink the Rain, though, leaves the listener with the impression that it’s a gentle record, represented more by pastoral moments like “Down in the Woods” (“Way down in the woods / Touchin’ moss so soft / On the deadwood dyin’ / In time’s fertile arms”) than aggression....full text |
| Bbc |
| As Tom Waits’ voice is to Bing Crosby’s, so Malcolm Holcombe’s is to Tom Waits’: this is a wondrous far-travelled, beat-up and leaking old instrument, all sighs and groans, growls, rasps and mutterings (and that’s just in-between the singing). Listen to a Holcombe song and what you’re getting is personality in spades, a narrative so gritty with the noise of tough living that it rarely dips below the red on the authenticity meter. But the thing that makes To Drink the Rain worth listening to, in fact, is its artistry. The North Carolina native has changed labels and producers as restlessly as he’s moved homes, and this time round his long-serving slide guitar player Jared Taylor has crafted a production of superb balance, buttressing and cushioning the singer’s delivery with a subtlety that belies the single-take recording. The stately upright bass of Johnny Cash’s latter-day sideman Dave Roe, busy brushes of drummer Bobby Kallus, the sweet-toned fiddle of Luke Bulla and Taylor’s graceful picking on the dobro sparkle amongst the rumble and spit like bright stitching. Holcombe’s sentiments are as grizzled as his vocal chords, steeped in the lore of hard times and lonely travelling, but there’s an idiosyncratic poetry bedded in the lyrics: "Way down in the woods touchin' moss so soft / On the deadwood dyin' in time's fertile arms…" The appealing musical range takes in the fingerpicking ragtime of One Leg at a Time (which kicks things off with cheery brio), while the bustle of Where I Don’t Belong has a compelling story-song insistence....full text |
| Folkradio |
| W hen I first heard Malcolm Holcombe’s latest album, To Drink the Rain, I was transported down a long legacy of Country Blues singers calling to mind Chris Smither, Levon Helm and Townes Van Zandt. He has a voice that can’t lie, it’s been drenched and intoxicated by an eventful life that very nearly led him down the same path of Hank Williams! This provides the essence of his songs as well as the testament which can be heard in the dirt road of his voice. This isn’t the first time I’ve written this week about singers ‘moving out to the sticks’ as we like to say here. In the case of Malcolm Holcombe this connection gets better. I’ve just reviewed Kevin Welch’s latest release and wrote about him breaking from the commercial hub for the hills. Likewise, Holcombe follows suit and finds solace in the North Carolina Hills. Also, their new musical refuge can be found in the form of Music Road Records. A lable that has grabbed my interest in a big way. The Austin label is spearheaded by singer/songwriter Jimmy LaFave, recording engineer Fred Remmert, and investor Kelcy Warren, who agreed to become Malcolm’s new musical home. Like Welch, Malcolm Holcombe seems to have a lot to rejoice about on this album. Makes you wonder how heavy that burden he was carrying was that bordered on self-destruction. It was enough to make people jump at the news of him making a new album. Bass player and legendary veteran member of Johnny Cash’s last band, Dave Roe, new it was a big deal and cancelled a session at short notice to make it for the recording, one, he stated, that was worth fighting for! After listening to the album, I can only agree. It has that real feel authenticity that is often lacking in music today but is something you can’t conjure up, you have to have lived it! The twelve track one-take performances on this album are testimony to a great singer and what makes great music....full text |
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