![]() HillBender vocalists Nolan Lawrence and Jim Rea may deliver their lines exactingly, like "Tommy" impersonators, throughout. The tender young lover’s hope for a good year to come, “1921,” is now tenderer than ever, for similar reasons. Unplug the music scoring "Tommy"’s creepy encounters with his sadist Cousin Kevin and his pederast Uncle Ernie, and the campiness of the original disappears while the creepiness intensifies. ![]() Rearrange the electric opera for banjo, mandolin and acoustic six-string, bass and resonator guitars, and it turns out that all grandiosity simply melts away. The HillBenders’ bluegrass approach allows the band to embrace the former while setting "Tommy" free from the latter. Why? Townsend’s rock opera was a defining document in the transformation of “rock ‘n’ roll” into “rock,” and it remains emblematic of the expanded artistic possibilities that attended that shift - and the ever-present accompanying danger of pretentiousness. All credit to Pete Townsend and company for getting there first, of course, but seriously: Nearly four decades beyond this rock opera’s debut, the only "Tommy" I will ever look forward to hearing again is the HillBenders’. Van Zant’s "Psycho" must have been a rewarding artistic puzzle for the filmmakers but was of little interest to viewers, who mainly just wondered: “Why?” Thankfully, the HillBenders’ "Tommy" is much more than an exercise in musical problem solving. The HillBenders have made a "Tommy" right in the line with the Who’s original - but with strictly bluegrass instruments.Īnd even that comparison’s off. The HillBenders are attempting to recreate "Tommy." The nearest comparison I can come up with is director Gus Van Zant’s version of "Pyscho," filmed shot-for-Hitchcock-shot but with different actors. But the Hillbenders, an acoustic five-piece from Springfield, Missouri, aren’t attempting to reinvent the Who’s classic album in the way the Lips did Pink Floyd’s classic. Other acts have done new versions of classic albums the Flaming Lips’ recording of "Dark Side of the Moon" springs to mind. The HillBenders’ bluegrass version of "Tommy" has no real precedent.
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