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Driving Home

Cheryl Wheeler - Driving Home Audio CD

A fair review of the Cheryl Wheeler "Driving Home" Audio CD. Please note that the below review is the views of the authors, and authors only. You can get a complete list of all Cheryl Wheeler reviews here, or go back to the Cheryl Wheeler tabs.

Band: Cheryl Wheeler
Title: Driving Home
Rating:

Release Date: 1993-10-04
Media: Audio CD

Tracks: 1: Driving Home 2: Silver Lining 3: Music in My Room 4: Frequently Wrong But Never in Doubt 5: Don't Forget the Guns 6: Act of Nature 7: 75 Septembers 8: Spring 9: Bad Connection 10: When Fall Comes to New England 11: Orbiting Jupiter 12: Almost

Patient Listener
My favorite is 75 Septembers. Driving Home is a remarkable deeply felt album. The song is autobiographical and paints a vivid picture of Wheeler's Maryland family farm in a time long ago ( Wilson is President) and the painful transition that urbanization has brought "now those fields are all four lanes" . When Fall Comes to New England is also a lush depiction of maple tress in the fall that are "Irish Setter red". Finally Frequently Wrong but Never in Doubt is a ode to a misfit who is lovable,loyal and stubborn all at the same time. If you like American folk music and appreciate carefully crafted lyrics and tunes, good vocals and guitar playing - you need this album. .

A Classic

The album is well put together. Best Tracks: Almost, Driving Home, Act of Nature

Cheryl Wheeler displays her amble writing abilities as she takes the listener on a wonderful journey. Production is not heavy handed which allows the wonderful musicianship shine on each track. Her varied style is a breath of fresh air. The lyrics a deep and thoughtful without being trite.

This was my introduction to Cheryl Wheeler, and prompted me to buy all of her other albums.
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True to the artist's spirit
I accepted the invitation and, after settling into some hideously uncomfortable chairs, typical of a church basement I suppose, Cheryl Wheeler came out armed only with her magnificent voice and guitar. In 1993, I was invited to go to the Rabbit Hill Coffee House in South Salem, NY for no other reason than the place, a church basement, played host to great singers and musicians. By the time she was half way into her first song, I was hooked. I was blessed (how appropriate to be so in a church basement). I bought her CD, "Driving Home" that evening.
Thus, I wish to share this blessing by recommending you buy this album as soon as possible. Cheryl's songwriting is masterful, lyrical and captivating. In her live performance, she holds your heart in her hands, expresses her heart with every note and word, and fills the room with joy. She joins other treasures of American traditional, "folk-pop" including Tom Rush, Tom Paxton, Joan Baez, and the late John Stewart whose "Phoenix Concerts" album is an ode to American history and the American heart. Cheryl has matched Mr. Stewart's gifts and we are all the better for it.

One of Cheryl's BEST!
The music is flawless but real; her guitar has never sounded better. The stories told by this amazing singer/song writer are timeless. Cheryl's voice is absolutely at it's beautiful best on this CD. Folk that reaches far beyond simple folk and into an acoustic miracle and finds it's way all the way to the edge of pop (but doesn't ever cross in!). It's hard to find another artist so connected to life and able to so poignantly tell about it. .

A True Comic And Poet
It didn't take much prompting to search it out after hearing "Don't Forget The Guns" on a local radio station. DRIVING HOME - Cheryl Wheeler

This album first introduced me to the music of Cheryl Wheeler way back in 1994. After playing it, the host declared, "what a sweet little song . . . " which appropriately reflected the sardonic humour it conveyed. How can "we don't look for trouble, but by golly, if we're in it/it's nice to know we're free to blow nine hundred rounds a minute" not do that. This is the comic side of Cheryl Wheeler. The poet is something else again, and "Driving Home" reflects that side in a quite breathless fashion.

"75 Septembers" resonates with me, because my late father was born in September. I well remember his 75th, because I couldn't be there for it, as I was travelling in Turkey at the time. The lines that really speak to me are "now the fields are all four lanes and the moon's not just a name/are you more amazed at how things change or how they stay the same/and do you sit here on this porch and wonder how the time flies by/or does it seem to barely creep along/with 75 Septembers come and gone. " There's nothing much else I want to say after that.

There's hardly a song I wouldn't recommend on this album. Right now I feel somewhat lost to find the words that would adequately describe the emotional pull and insight of these songs. I'll just single out in particular "Act of Nature", "Bad Connection", "Frequently Wrong But Never In Doubt", "Almost", and, of course, "75 Septembers. "

There are light and airy, good feeling moments on this album too. "Silver Lining", "When Fall Comes To New England", "Music In My Room" and "Spring", both musically and lyrically, flow effortlessly and leave me with a sense of real affection for Cheryl's songwriting ability.

Cheryl's collaboration with Janis Ian on "Orbiting Jupiter" is literally in a galaxy of its own. I have recently rediscovered Janis Ian too through a not totally convincing local cover of "At Seventeen. " There's another incredible, durable talent. Janis, that is, not the local.

"Driving Home" is one of my favourite albums of all time. It's right up there in the top 3 along with Mary Chapin Carpenter's "Stones In The Road" and "Between Here And Gone". I am rather torn across all three and I keep changing my mind on which one might be the best. I like to think I can just appreciate them all because they all offer something different. Perhaps it is no co-incidence that Mary Chapin sings background vocal on "75 Septembers".

Do yourself a favour. Listen to this album. Take the advice of respected music critic Robert Oermann, who, in the album's liner notes suggests that by the time you've finished listening to these songs, Cheryl will be as deep in your heart as someone you smile at every day.

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You can see a complete list of all Cheryl Wheeler discography, or go back to the Cheryl Wheeler tabs. There is also a good guide on how to read guitar tabs here.