Soul Stirrer: Patty Griffin, 'Downtown Church'

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PATTY GRIFFIN RECORDED her seventh album at the pulpit of the Downtown Presbyterian Church, a Nashville landmark built in 1849 and used as a Union hospital during the Civil War. Such a spiritual and historic setting is certainly appropriate for this collection of gospel numbers that marry her achy country vocals with churchly swagger. It obviously inspired Griffin not only in her performance but in the selection of songs, as the album's title, "Downtown Church," makes clear.

It also informs the sound of the album. Buddy Miller, the veteran producer who manned the boards for Allison Krauss and Robert Plant on their Grammy-winning "Raising Sand," captures an open, airy sound that echoes the exuberance and worry inherent in these songs. Churches tend to have great acoustics, which makes them apt alternatives to recording studios, but the Downtown Presbyterian Church lends this album an almighty gravity.

Spiritually, Griffin has described herself as a lapsed Catholic with interests in many faiths. That curiosity extends to her music, and "Downtown Church" includes two original compositions, a lovely Spanish-language hymn, spirituals and covers of religious songs by Hank Williams and Big Mama Thornton. It also features a heavenly host of singers, including Emmylou Harris, Raul Malo, Jim Lauderdale, Shawn Colvin, and Julie Miller. But Regina and Ann, daughters of one of the original members of the Fairfield Four, steal the show with their combustible backing vocals on "If I Had My Way" and "Waiting for My Child."

Griffin has no trouble investing opener "House of Gold," the hushed "Little Fire" and the elegiac "Never Grow Old" with a mix of worldly pathos and spiritual yearning, but the faster, more celebratory numbers, such as "Move Up," lack the sense of gritty ebullience that informs so much gospel. This style of music demands a sense of abandon — to the song as much as to the Lord — and Griffin is too reserved and controlled to really let go. In particular, she lacks the righteous sass to put over Thornton's "I Smell a Rat," which here sounds gaudy and reaching.

On the other hand, "Death's Got a Warrant" sounds brimstone fearful as her band hammers out ominous knells out of some old spiritual: Are those nails being hammered into coffins? Tools being thrust into soil? The idea is simple but powerful, the song short but forceful. "Downtown Church" is as flawed as any sinner, but it's moments like "Warrant" that save this soulful endeavor.

Written by Express contributor Stephen M. Deusner
Photo courtesy ATO Records