HOOLIE!
Gettin' Underway
Self-released (1999)
http://www.hoolieonline.com

Hoolie! is Jerry Casault and Katherine Morris; they are from Bay City, Michigan and they perform Celtic and nautical music. I first heard them this year at Folk Alliance, though not intentionally. I was walking down the hall when I heard Celtic music...a little unusual for this year's conference in Florida...complete with step dancing noises. I followed the noises to where people (later identified as Hoolie!) were singing music of the Isles at the end of a hallway, accompanied by a man who had what looked like a Dietzgen portable drafting board for hoofing. I watched for a while, and a cowboy singer approached.
"I don't usually like this kind of music, but I heard the tap dancing," he told me.
I thought they were pretty good and asked for a promotional CD.

I was surprised to find no hoofer on Gettin' Underway. I was also surprised to find the nautical songs, though they'd told me that their new album was going to have mostly nautical songs on it. They were moving in that direction, they said, if only because there is a little less competition. A wise choice, especially since they are living on the Great Lakes. This acoustic debut album contains some well-known Celtic standards a couple traditional nautical songs, and four songs written in traditional style by Hoolie!

There are two best things about Gettin' Underway. One is their enthusiasm, here is one album that cannot be faulted on that account! The second is Jerry Casault's vox, which is a "rich baritone" similar to William Pint, the sort that makes you think of brawny seamen and brawling Irishmen. Katherine Morris' voice, on the other hand, is surely not off the cover of Cosmo. It reminds me of Jean Ritchie, melodic but not what you expect, and in this case not particularly powerful. But in the end the combination emerges as a really interesting sound juxtaposition.

Katherine wrote two of the nautical songs on Gettin' Underway, both local and "authentic," composed in traditional style. One is "Sailin' On the Saginaw." and the other "Capt'n Eddy." At first I thought the latter really was a fin de siécle song about a woman whose husband is a steamboat captain. As it turns out, Katherine wrote it about her own husband's boat, The Princess, which you can see on the back of the booklet.
We both build up the pressure and we both blow off the steam
On her it looks so pretty but on me it just looks mean.

Probably my favorite song on the album is a Jerry composition and vocal, "Bonham Richard" h is about John Paul Jones' Bonham Richard and its battle with the British man-o-war Serapis. With whistle, bodhrán, and guitar at the stern, the synchroneity is a little odd, leading to an unexpectedly emphatic dreamlike, punky quality. Imagine the spare ghosts of sailors of the colonies off the starboard bow. The other of his compositions is a cute Irish parody, about serious drinking, to "Sweet Betsy From Pike."

Of the rest, most are recognizable from the experienced listener's memory. Shel Silverstein's "The Great Lakes Song" (about the Great Lakes) is reminiscent of Lee Murdock. "The Rocky Road To Dublin," "Loch Lomond," "Nancy Whiskey," and "Go To Sea No More" give Jerry a great chance to show off his voice and DADGAD, sometimes subtly backed by Katherine. "The Diamond as always is a strong song, this time with plenty of harmonica and percussion. With luck on their new album they will find plenty of new songs from the artesian well of Great Lakes lore!

write: gennett at gorge dot net

The Columbia Gypsy