Times Like These

Pagosa Hot Strings is a very capable group of young’uns from Pagosa Springs, Colorado. You won’t think young’uns when you hear what they do with their instruments on this, their first recording. I expect to hear a lot from these young men in years to come. Pagosa Hot Strings is made up of: Josiah Payne, 15 - mandolin, Jared Payne, 13 - guitar, Carson Park, 12 fiddle, and Dan Park - bass, age not disclosed, but from his picture on the cover, I would guess he is the only boy in this group who owns a house and could grow hair on his face. He also wrote about three of the songs on this CD. My favorite is Dan’s "Spirit of the Night." The spiritual lyrics and haunting melody, along with the changing tenor voice of Carson Park, remind me of very early Neil Young. As a matter of fact, a couple of tunes have southern rock overtones and are arranged nicely into acoustic-bluegrass settings. The Bill Monroe tune "Big Mon," sets the pace and gives the listener an idea of what these gentlemen can do. Juanalee Park adds banjo to drive this bluegrass chestnut on home. The tight instrumental breaks on this recording reflect musical maturity and group harmony. They can be contacted at skigrass@compuserve.com