“With traditional Appalachian and Western sounds blended with modern folk and country, The Marshall Pass has delivered a worthy first effort with Phantom Train. Only seven songs long, the disc has all the required imagery of the Old West – trains, guns,and graveyards as well as the more eternal emotional themes of loss, leaving and heartache.”

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With traditional Appalachian and Western sounds blended with modern folk and country, The Marshall Pass has delivered a worthy first effort with Phantom Train. Only seven songs long, the disc has all the required imagery of the Old West – trains, guns,and  graveyards as well as the more eternal emotional themes of loss, leaving and heartache.

Made up of music composer Duncan Arsenault and lyricist Craig Rawding, the Marshall Pass is just one of the many new groups that is adding to the rapidly expanding Americana landscape. Based in Boston, the two came together after the tragic loss of a mutual friend and music partner. While hanging out during the aftermath, Arsenault and Rawding began writing and playing together. Even a casual listen reveals the grieving and loss of their real life experience, even while it is couched in images of other times and places. The truth of the emotion carries the CD to its highest moments and holds the disc together from start to finish.

Playing all the instruments as well as singing and writing the material, Arsenault and Rawding have created a sound shimmering with ghostly echoes that pass through the acoustic instrumentation. Rawding’s vocals recall the Subdudes’s Tommy Malone in a less driven mode, giving an earnest quality to each song and making listeners believe he has felt it all.  Arsenault’s clean, clear string work provides the solid base from which each song takes off on its journey. New subject matter mixes with standard themes to enrich this short set. On California Blue, the narrator acknowledges the challenges inherent in having a girlfriend who is a successful musician on tour. In Stranded in Perdition, the band puts a spin on a well-known lyric to set a more personal theme with “Nobody knows the trouble I’ve found.”

The Marshall Pass has come out strong, especially for a band leading with a self-contained and self-produced project.With more time, a little seasoning, and the opportunity to develop from it’s starting place, this band has the potential to set it’s course for a long musical career.