From the Pasture to the Future in Bloomington, MN

The Chicago Tribune
says that
the Waybacks
offer "a near-ideal balance of irreverence, chops, discipline, and originality," and that actually sums it up quite well. This primarily acoustic
folk-rock
group is irreverent about genre boundaries, jumping gleefully back and forth between the lines that separate
blues
from
bluegrass
,
rock
jazz
, and
Celtic
music from
pop
, but they're never so irreverent that they just sound goofy. Their chops are considerable, but (in the studio anyway) they never lapse into wanky self-indulgence. Their discipline and originality are manifest in tightly written, hook-filled songs and unusual arrangements, and all of those qualities come together beautifully in this, the group's fourth album.
From the Pasture to the Future
offers brilliant instrumental hot
(
"Monkey Pants,"
"Hot Kranski"
), a sharply rocking kissoff song (
"Helping Me,"
which features the timeless couplet "It's not that you're bad for me/It's just that you're bad"), and a very fine
rhumba
"Armando's Rhumba"
). It also features a funny
number titled
"Petrified Man"
and a beautiful Texas-style dance number called
"Bluebird Waltz."
The Waybacks
are not terribly convincing as purveyors of straight-up
traditional Irish
music, as
"The Blacksmith"
demonstrates, but everything else works so well that you hardly even notice that one. Very highly recommended. ~ Rick Anderson