Remember Kathy Mattea, country music’s sweet, fresh voice during an era just before country was about to turn sour?

Mattea has a new CD in the works, and it’s one that’s sure to attract bluegrass fans. Simply entitled, “COAL,” the CD will be released by Captain Potato Records on April 1.

“This record reached out and took me,” Mattea says on her Web site. ” It called to me to be made.”

From the West Virginia hill country, Mattea — even in her country heyday — was never too far removed from bluegrass. On this project, she nearly steps completely into the bluegrass circle — it’s her first album minus drums.

Being from coal-rich West Virginia, Mattea gives plenty of insight into the recording on her Web site. It’s a project that wasn’t taken lightly. In fact, Mattea said the Sago Mine Disaster and its 12 miner deaths made her realize it was time to tackle the “COAL” project, which, she says, has been on her mind since she was 19, when she first heard “Dark as a Dungeon.” “This record reached out and took me,” Mattea says on her Web site. “It called to me to be made.

Mattea is no stranger to coal and coal country. Both her grandparents were miners and her mom worked for the United Mine Workers Association.

“COAL” includes songs by Jean Ritchie, Billy Edd Wheeler, Hazel Dickens, Utah Phillips, Merle Travis and Darrell Scott. The studio team includes names that are no strangers to the bluegrass crowd, beginning with Mattea’s hand-picked producer, Marty Stuart. He also plays guitar, mandolin and mandola on the tracks and joins Patty Loveless for background vocals on one song.

Bryon House plays bass and Stuart Duncan adds fiddle, mandolin and banjo. Longtime Mattea guitarist Bill Cooley handles six-string chores. Other musicians are John Catchings, Randy Leoago and Fred Newell. Tim O’Brien, who has had a long musical association with Mattea, and his sister Mollie O’Brien contribute vocal work on one cut.

Editors Note: Kathy Mattea’s web site is currently featuring an interview from her recent appearance on NPR’s “Living On Earth” that features some of the music from Mattea’s forth-coming album “COAL” as well as some personal insight into growing up, living in a coal mining community and the environmental effects of the coal industry.

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Patience, it seems, always has its rewards.

Don Anderson, a West Virginia songwriter, undoubtedly would agree. He finally finished his third CD of his own material, a recording project that was started in 2001. According to co-producer John Titus, health problems sidelined Anderson until recently, when he was able to return to the studio.

Don Anderson - The Wrinkles on His Face

The result is “The Wrinkles on His Face,” a 12-cut offering penned largely by Anderson, who does all the lead vocal work and also plays bass on the album. The long road to getting this CD finished definitely has a reward — it’s a fine collection of well-produced, well-performed material.

Since I’ve started reviewing CDs for BluegrassJournal.com, I’ve found it can be a roller-coaster experience. Sure, I know what to expect when I pop a new IIIrd Tyme Out CD or one by Ralph Stanley in the player. It’s the Don Andersons of the bluegrass world, the unknowns, that create the peaks and valleys of the CD critique world. You just never know what you’re going to hear.

I’m happy to report Don Anderson and his group of songs soar pretty high to the peak side of things. Anderson has a pleasant voice, perhaps more traditional country than high-lonesome bluegrass, and he’s a good songwriter. His songs run the gamut, from the old-timey, hard-driving sound of “Sally’s Fool,” which is the CD’s first cut; to the Merle Haggard-like “Silver Eagle,” definitely a road musician’s lament; to the gospel, “We’ll Meet Again.”

Songwriters like Anderson, I believe, are a bit like an open book, letting the listener get a close glimpse inside their lives. Anderson’s tunes definitely have that touch.

The musicianship is another shining factor for this CD. Titus said he recorded the rhythm guitar (by Tommy Anderson) and mandolin tracks in 2001. The mandolin contributions sizzle, courtesy of Alan Perdue, Mountain Heart’s original mandolin player who went on to do a stint with IIIrd Tyme Out. Also noteworthy are the banjo acrobatics of Ramie Bennett, some nice Dobro work by Bruce Jones and fiddle licks by Owen Saunders, who spent with Doyle Lawson’s Quicksilver.

It’s a pretty impressive lineup of musicians backing up a genuine, earthy singer and his equally earthy songs.

“Wrinkle on His Face” is the second CD I’ve heard in recent weeks from Titus’s studio, J&V Audio in Camden, W. Va. Both have been top-notch productions. Titus, incidentally, is on the verge of opening a new studio that will be inside a log-cabin-style structure. In his liner notes, Don Anderson mentions Titus’s new studio and his desire to be one of the first to record there.

We’re waiting to hear more.

Editor’s Note: For more information on “The Wrinkles on His Face” contact John Titus at (304)-269-6179

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