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The Goins Brothers - Sweet Sunny South

(Old Homestead OHS-90165) 1985

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I don't know the recording date for the Goins Brothers second (& final) album for Old Homestead, but the line-up is largely the same as their 1981 At Their Best LP. Apart from the absence of Tommy Boyd, the only change is the appearance of Roy Lee Centers' son Lenny on the final track, a version of Carter Stanley's I'll Take The Blame where he contributes lead guitar & vocal.

Overall the album is quite uptempo and a enjoyable listen, although much of it is comprised of bluegrass standards, eg:- Johnny Bond's I Wonder Where You Are Tonight, which was cut by the Louvin Brothers, Flatt & Scruggs, Jim & Jesse, Bill Monroe, Red Allen etc.; a fast-paced rendition of Long Journey Home which is similar to Ralph's 1967 version (although Melvin wasn't on that Jalyn session despite being in the CMB's a the time); Gotta Travel On, an old folksong arranged by Paul Clayton & popularised in bluegrass circles by Bill Monroe; Don't Let Your Deal Go Down plus Cora Is Gone, which were first recorded by Flatt & Scruggs; Bill Clifton's White Washed Chimney; Down In The Willow Garden; Don Reno's Barefoot Nellie; and finally the Stanley Brothers' I'll Take The Blame.

Perhaps of more interest, Bluegrass Blues is a catchy number co-written by WLSI DJ Mike Paxton with Edward T. Branham (aka Kentucky Slim), who'd played on the debut Bluegrass Hits Old And New LP. (Melvin also gets co-writer credit for the song on that LP). Bluegrass Blues had been recorded for an unreleased Jessup LP, which finally was released on the Bluegrass Blues cassette in 1984.

Another original, Song Of The Mountain by Floyd Stewart, has some fine fiddle work by Art Stamper and is a nostalgic lament about missing the mountain home & the old folk...

As with other Goins Brothers releases, there's a nod to their time with the Lonesome Pine Fiddlers, with Twenty-One Years originally from the Lonesome Pine Fiddlers first RCA Victor session in 1952. (Ralph Stanley also cut the song on his The Bluegrass Sound Of... LP in 1968, whilst Melvin was a member of the CMB's, although as with Long Journey Home he wasn't present on that particular recording).

The title cut, Sweet Sunny South is an old lament that seems to have origins in the Minstrel shows of the 1800's, including a version published as Take Me Home in 1853.^[1] Lead vocals on this song are by Dan Jones, who had previously sung it with the Bluegrass Alliance on their 1969 debut 'Bluegrass Alliance' LP (American Heritage AH-LP-21). Dan also sings lead on I Wonder Where You Are Tonight, Cora Is Gone, White Washed Chimney and Song Of The Mountain.

Finally Your Old Standby by Jim Eanes had also been previously cut by the Goins Brothers on Bluegrass Hits Old And New.

I don't have a copy of this LP yet, but according to the lukewarm 'Bluegrass Unlimited' review: "...the album's overall sound quality is only minimally acceptable. The final mix is overloaded with excessive reverb and unexplained variations in the volume level. Also, side 2 of the review copy was pressed slightly off center which significantly distorts the last three or four songs." The MP3 Rip of the album, which I found on the internet sounds pretty good to me...

Lenny Centers, who does a credible job on lead vocal on I'll Take The Blame, can also be seen performing with the Goins Brothers in a 1978 'Shriners Bluegrass Festival' performance, when he was 16: https://appalshoparchive.org/Detail/objects/14525.

Dan Jones later won the 1987 Kentucky State Fair pipe smoking contest, with a contest-record of 1 hour 40 minutes and 22 seconds. The event was sponsored by 'Brown & Wiliamson Tobacco Corp.'^[2] In 2017, he died aged 77, after 'battling the effects of multiple major cancers'.^[3]

• Melvin Goins: guitar
• Ray Goins: banjo
• Dan Jones: mandolin
• Dave Skeens: bass
• Art Stamper: fiddle
• Lenni Centers: guitar (a)

NB: (a) Lenny appear on one track: I'll Take The Blame.

^{[1] Sheet Music for Take Me Home, sung by Christy's Minstrels and composed by W.L. Bloomfield:- https://www.loc.gov/resource/sm1853.710410.0?st=gallery
[2] Bluegrass Unlimited's "General Store", April 1988.
[3] https://bluegrasstoday.com/danny-jones-remembered/}