“the weekly read on vermont news, views and culture”

Burlington, Vermont

May 16, 2001

RICHARD RUANE, THINGS THAT STRANGERS SAY

(Riptone Records, CD)   Richard Ruane has stayed closer to home since his Feast or Famine days in the ‘80s – having children will do that to you. But the longtime Vermont folkie hasn’t been idle: Ruane founded the Ripton Community Coffee House six years ago and heads up its monthly concert series. He’s lent his talents as a performer, organizer and sound engineer to various concerts and festivals, mostly around Addison County.

      But while the kids are growing, Ruane has been sowing other seeds – namely, writing songs, and Things That Strangers Say represents the fruit of those labors. It’s his first solo album, albeit with more than a dozen old friends on hand to help fill our the sound. Overall, Things is fairly spare and unencum­bered by production frills, it’s a stirring collection of tracks, recorded at Ad Astra with pristine clarity and warmth. At its most complex, the layers tend to be two or three vocalists and acoustic instrumentation, none of them vying for dominance.

            Ruane has dolled up his own reedy voice – a serious contender for Richard Thompson sound-alike – with a bevy of beautiful female harmonies from Rachel Bissex, Patti Casey, Jennifer Kimball and oth­ers. In addition, Ruane’s adroit guitar and mandolin playing finds stellar accompaniment with fiddle (Pete Sutherland and Viveka Fox), stand-up bass (mostly Mitch Barron) and more The whole lot of ‘em are damn fine.

            Lyrically, Ruane is a storyteller with a gift for place and character. Keenly observant, he builds a song from a town wino who’s “better known than our senators, congressman or mayor”; from the satis­faction of a good coffeeshop (“I come here for the bonhomie. I come here to restore my chi.”); and from the usual songwriter sources love, life, death, people and places on the road. Though many of the 15 songs here favor minor chords and slower tempos, Ruane picks it up occasionally, and is not without humor. One of his gifts is off-setting a morose feel­ing with a jaunty tempo, as in “Bartender,” my favorite track here, or the reverse: “Joy That Carries Me” doesn’t sound all that merry.

            One of the most “sensitive singer-songwriter” tunes on Things is the poignant “Light of the World,” addressing the death of his father. But Ruane closes with a lighter note on “Well-Meaning Folks with Guitars.” You’ve got to love a folkie who can make fun of folkies: “Our songs show our souls just like a x-ray/We’ll add bass, synth and drums to get more airplay.” Chances are this one’s a hit in con­cert. Find out this Saturday when Ruane joins a few friends in song at the Bristol Bakery’s new music series.

– Pamela Polston