How Late'll Ya Play 'Till?, Vol. 2 - Studio

Like his contemporary Ry Cooder, David Bromberg had a way of taking the disparate strands of American roots music—country, blues, jazz, bluegrass—and making it feel like part of the same strand. And like Cooder, he was able to imprint it with his own eccentric signature. That’s precisely the nature of 1976’s How Late’ll Ya Play Til? Vol. 2, a studio counterpart to the live album of the same name. For Bromberg, individualism is the essence of American music. As classic as these performances feel, they're all tweaked by Bromberg’s unusual point of view. A bleating sax solo is inserted in the middle of a bluegrass tune (“Get Up and Go/Fiddle Tunes”); a little undercurrent of funk alters an otherwise orderly piece of acoustic blues (“Chubby Thighs”); a beautifully unadorned piece of solo guitar (“Dallas Rag/Maple Leaf Rag”) arrives in the midst of what feels like a gloriously unkempt affair. Though Bromberg's well known for his impish sense of humor, some of best pieces here are the most sincere. “Summer Wages” and “Young Westley” are disarmingly simple country tunes, while the poignant lament “Kaatskill Serenade” is one of Bromberg’s finest originals.