At first glance, this looks like another Cooder soundtrack – possibly from an animation film, the cryptic clue being the charcoal, cartoon-like drawing of a smug-looking cat on the cover. But as it turns out it’s a concept album, based on the life of, wait for it, a left-wing ginger tomcat called Buddy who wears his blue-collar credentials on his, er, presumably well-licked paw. Seriously, this record is based on an actual feline that lived in a suitcase, in a laneway behind a record shop in Vancouver. Someone had sent Cooder an envelope of clippings about the cat who passed away in 2005 with a photo of the legendary bluesman Leadbelly – the kitty’s mug photo-shopped onto the face! Cooder set about creating a story based around the life of the cat who he re-imagined as a sort of card-carrying union man – a Moggie Guthrie if you will.
It’s hard to know just how seriously to take the concept, especially with titles like ‘Red Cat Till I Die’ and ‘One Cat, One Vote, One Beer’. But with the songs and musicianship as good as it is, it doesn’t really matter.
There are echoes of Springsteen’s We Shall Overcome – The Seeger Sessions (Pete Seeger and his brother Mike are featured on several tracks). But sonically, most of this harks back to Cooder’s 1970s output when he pursued vanishing American music as if it were a Smithsonian project. Some of the songs here, like ‘The Dying Truck Driver’ and ‘Hank Williams’, could be from his Chicken Skin Music or Paradise And Lunch albums (unlike recent efforts, he sings as well as playing guitar on most of the songs here). Chieftain Paddy Moloney is one of the first to be heard – his whistle and pipes grace ‘Suitcase In My Hand’, while Van Dyke Parks turns up on several numbers, most notably ‘Footprints In The Snow’ and ‘Cat And Mouse’ (a warning against cats befriending rodents). Another big name guest is drummer Jim Keltner who keeps a solid backbeat throughout.
It’s a little long at 17 tracks, and hard to take in one sitting, but these songs present Americana in such an oddly compelling way that it’s almost impossible to ignore.