I love when young people make old things cool again. Last night I saw three young musicians from North Carolina bring to life the old string-jugband music of the African American tradition. They were just back from a European tour where people went nuts over their tunes. Most of songs they find on out-of-print or never-recorded albums. The work out the tunes, add their own spice and go to town on their fiddles, banjos and kazoos.
The crazy thing about The Carolina Chocolate Drops is that I first heard them in Prague last November when I was listening to a French radio station at 3 a.m. (jetlag) The announcer was just raving about how this band whose name she couldn't pronounce was reviving a lost tradition with great reviews. It's true. Even Rolling Stone singled them out. And that night in Prague I resolved to look them up when I got to North Carolina. I didn't have to wait long!
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