Album Review: The Ravenna Colt

The Ravenna Colt
Slight Spell
[Removador Records]

Slight Spell by Ravenna Colt is already a contender for most compelling debut of 2010 – and it’s only April.

The Ravenna Colt mastermind Johnny Quaid also happens to be the original guitarist for the ethereal rock outfit My Morning Jacket (whose lead singer and cousin of Quaid, Yim Yames is credited as Associate Producer here). But Quaid is deeply rooted in the Louisville music scene, and throughout the eight tracks that make up the 40 minute Slight Spell, he showcases many of them.

The songs are tinged with a southern twang that leaves a sense of fascination and longing for a bygone era that may or may not have ever existed. Quaid co-produces the record with Wax Fang drummer Kevin Ratterman, and together they create an atmospheric loneliness that seems to be the common thread that runs throughout the songs on Slight Spell.

The album opens with an air of reminiscence as “South of Ohio” pays homage to the simple life he remembers of his childhood in Kentucky. The crying spurts of steel guitar hint at the simplicity that we all try to find as we stray further from youth with age. The heavy-handed country not just here, but throughout the album, vaguely reminds me of Whiskeytown at their finest, when they were playing true, sad-bastard country with no sense irony in sight.

“Now to Begin” rolls off with a suggestion of the sinister, while “Prepare to Be Delivered” follows with a wailing tumble; both songs feature The Fervor’s Natalie Felker on background vocals. She leaves a haunting thumbprint on each track as her soft, affecting voice interlaces with Quaid’s aching croon. And “Foresake and Combine” is by far the most upbeat song on Slight Spell – but as the second-to-last song it still can’t get out from under the indelible sadness that Quaid has cultivated throughout the record.