https://www.gaesteliste.de/review/show.html?_nr=22256

Malcolm Holcombe - 'Bits & Pieces' - review - Gaesteliste (Germany) - June 2023

Malcolm Holcombe - Bits & Pieces
proper
Format: CD

When the voice of the songwriter veteran Malcolm Holcome, who now lives back in his native North Carolina, sounds particularly fragile and vulnerable on his 18th album, there is certainly reason for crying: Holcombe was diagnosed with cancer last year and decided to have it to record a new collection of songs together with his "musical shadow" Jared Tyler as quickly as possible before he wanted to start a treatment that had probably made it impossible in the following. In short: In the meantime this treatment has taken place, and it was also successful - however, a pneumonia on one side, which he contracted during the course of the treatment, actually prevents further musical activities at the moment. Ultimately, the diagnosis' sword of Damocles had a creatively beneficial effect on the production of the album, because the combative note, which runs like a red thread through Holcombe's acoustically but by no means spartanly staged "Country for Old Men Songs" (to put it in a categorization), lends the songs with their "now more than ever tenor" much more emphasis and clarity than the works of the past, which were sometimes presented in a lackluster way. Even Holcombe's often rather slurred pronunciation is clearly more defined here than usual.

-Ullrich Maurer-

Surf recommendation:
www.malcolmholcombe.com
www.facebook.com/malcolmholcombe
twitter.com/malcolmholcombe