Winter Harvest – Banditos
Guy Clark dreamed of himself and his grandpa as desperados waiting for a train. Warren Zevon was a desperado trying to forgo paying a big restaurant tab. And Waylon Jennings settled his love of bank robbing and bloodshed through songs that could make audiences dream along with him.
Winter Harvest’s “Banditos” is a country-rock fantasy of two things that are highly exotic for U.S. musicians – bank theft and Mexico. It’s a Bonnie & Clyde tale when nobody dares pull a gun on the looters. The police just chase them around. And in a reverse telling of “Pancho & Lefty,” it’s the cowboy and his highly capable mistress who let the cops hang around just out of kindness, I suppose.
Country & Western musicians have an obsession with outlaws and think that they could easily fit into the muddy boots of Jesse James if given the chance. Besides, the musicians do as much dreaming and fantasising as their audience does.
People don’t really die in the movies, or in country ballads. Every land on this Earth has its tales of generous outlaws. Winter Harvest’s greatest tool is the songwriter’s words. With them, he paints a world on “Banditos” that couldn’t be further removed from the noise and disappointments of the city. What’s wrong with sinking deep into a dream once in a while anyway?
Sara Trunzo – In Your Mercy
It’s a hard thing to contend with and one that might ruin your day if you dwell on it too much. But you ain’t got anything that’s secure from theft in this life. Not your neighbor either. Not anyone.
And while theft of private property is a serious thing, most people will gladly hand over all of their wealth in return for their memories. Sara Trunzo is one of those people. And this is the reason for her beautiful cover of the folk song “In Your Mercy,” originally a composition by Malcolm Holcombe of North Carolina.
But if you should take the chance and think about this terrible scenario for a moment, it may have an effect on your value system. Hell, it may even make you want to treat even the worst memories with a bit more kindness. Who’d want to lose anything that they worked so hard to have etched in their minds?
Nobody wants to consider that one day they’ll forget. But the ones who have stared directly at this outcome have to become highly courageous people. That’s what Sara Trunzo brings to the beautifully performed, heartbreaking, but ultimately heroic, “In Your Mercy.” This is a gorgeous folk and country song about the way that, really, time stands still, and we spin around it until we’re asked to start back again.
