Long Journey Home

In the early 1960s, when the Stanley Brothers were between record labels, they spent a week playing at Johnny's Used Cars near Baltimore. Johnny Wilbanks loved bluegrass music and used it as a sales device, paying bands to play in his lot and sponsoring a radio show that broadcast from his office. He also ran the small Wango label, for which the Stanleys recorded four albums after their parking lot engagement. This is the second of those four, originally issued as Wango 104 and reissued on LP by County in 1972 and on CD by Rebel in 1990. The material is classic Stanley Brothers: "Pretty Polly," "Rabbit in a Log," and the well-known title track. The other three albums in the series focused on gospel material, but this one is strictly secular and prominently features Ralph Stanley's flying-ice-chips banjo style and, even better, the pioneering cross-picking of guitarist George Shuffler on excellent performances of "Wildwood Flower" and "Will You Miss Me." But, as always, the most powerful moments are those that find Ralph Stanley's melismatic mountain tenor taking center stage, as on "Pretty Polly." A must for Stanley fans.