Larry Sparks - Ramblin Letters

(Acoustic Revival AR-33004) 1981.

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This album features a young Scott Vestal on banjo and former CMB Joe Meadows on fiddle. It was recorded at Tin Ear recording studio in Chicago, Illinois 24-26 Feb 1981.

The Acoustic Revival label was a subsidiary of Tin Ear, which was run by Bill and Claudia Landow in the early '80s.^[1] They also released the Curly Ray Cline classic Smarter Than The Average Idiot, and Charlie Sizemore's debut Congratulations.

Another decent album, it includes a mix of old and new songs, with renditions of Flatt & Scruggs' Your Love Is Like A Flower and I Don't Care Anymore; the Carter Family's I Wonder How The Old Folks Are At Home (aka Homestead On The Farm); Webb Pierce (I'm) Walking The Dog; plus Tragic Romance and (I Don't Want Your) Ramblin Letters from the Stanley Brothers.

Of the 'new' material Randal Hylton's Diggin In The Ground is a fine slab of nostalgia which Larry re-recorded on Blue Mountain Memories 1996.

Another fine track, These Blues They Got Me was written by Bob 'Cadillac' Holmes, and was later recorded by the Lonesome River Band as Them Blues.

The 3/4 time I'll Get Over You Someday has a somewhat derivative melody line and is credited to the Tin Ear label owner, W. Landow. He's also credited with the uptempo banjo instrumental Revelation although this sounds much more like a Scott Vestal composition.

This album was later reissued by Larry Sparks as Vintage (2016) with the omission of the two Randall Hylton tracks (Diggin In The Ground and Drinkin At The Water Hole) and remixed with a new bass overdub.

• Larry Sparks: guitar, mandolin, lead & baritone vocals
• Wendell Bartley: tenor vocal
• Roger 'Buck' Bellow: bass, mandolin
• Tom Boyd: dobro
• Joe Meadows: fiddle
• Scott Vestal: banjo, baritone vocal

Other artwork / related images:

[1] Ken Voss - Facebook post 10 Jan 2024 https://www.facebook.com/groups/illinoisrockandrollmusicarchives/posts/1829532714165775/
Acoustic Revival Records - Tin Ear Records
Tin Ear Music
1437 Howard St., Chicago, Illinois
Owners: Bill and Claudia Landow
From 1979-1985 Bill and Claudia Landow operated the Tin Ear collective in an effort to be a central outpost for the bluegrass music genre in Chicago. Operating out of an apartment building on Chicago's North Side the operation was an amalgam that included a bluegrass magazine, recording studio and two record labels - Acoustic Revival and Tin Ear.
In the late '70s a bluegrass scene was flourishing in Chicago. Grass Clippings, a monthly magazine launched in 1978 to cover the bluegrass festivals, jams, club dates and band in town. The Chicago Area Bluegrass Music and Pickin' Society, which ran the magazine for six years, was based at 1437 Howard Street, in a three-unit apartment building that also housed Tin Ear, a recording studio and label dedicated to bluegrass and folk music.
Ralph Stanley recorded there after a concert at the Old Town School of Folk Music, on sessions that ended up on Smarter Than the Average Idiot, the 1984 album by West Virginia fiddler and longtime Stanley sideman Curly Ray Kline. Special Consensus, singer and guitarist Larry Sparks, the Great Chicago Bluegrass Band, North Carolina banjoist Don Reno, and other artists recorded albums there, and the studio also held sessions for Steve Goodman and Bob Gibson.
The operation was a labor of love for Bill and Claudia Landow. Coming out of DeVry University, Bill was a recording engineer who said his life "took a paradigm shift" after he attended classes at the Old Town School of Folk Music. "Bluegrass was not on the radio," he said. Tin Ear "tried to promote the music and let people know what was going on. We were a hub." (from the book Country and Midwestern by Marc Guarino) Discography

• 1979 The Greater Chicago Bluegrass Band - The Greater Chicago Bluegrass Band Est. 1973 (Tin Ear 1327)
• 1979 Brad Wise and the Bluegrass Guys - Sugarfoot Rag b/w Bluegrass Breakdown (Tin Ear 45000)
• 1979 Special Consensus - Big City Ramble b/w Black Mountain Rag (Tin Ear 45001)
• 1979 Special Consensus - Special Consensus Bluegrass Band (Tin Ear 33002)
• 1981 Larry Sparks - Ramblin' Letters (Acoustic Revival 33004)
• 1981 Wade Hampton Millar - In the Days I Went A-Courtin' (Acoustic Revival 33005)
• 1983 The Tennessee Rail Splitters - The Tennessee Rail Splitters (Tin Ear 33006)
• 1983 Johnny Gray - Great Movin' Day b/w Old Old House (Acoustic Revival 45006)
• 1983 Johnny Gray - A Little Boy Called Joe b/w Will the Circle Be Unbroken (Acoustic Revival 45007)
• 1983 Special Consensus Bluegrass Band - Blue Northerns (Acoustic Revival 33009)
• 1984 Curly Ray Cline - Smarter Than the Average Idiot (Tin Ear 33010)
• 1985 Charlie Sizemore - Congratulations (Acoustic Revival 33011)