The Revelator, Bill Baue, Killing
the Buddha
Though roots musician Gillian Welch may not follow the gospel
formula in her art, Bill Baue, music director at Radio Free
Brattleboro in Vermont, argues that she brings her listeners closer
to God. Writing for Killing the Buddha, Baue studies
the metamorphosis of Welch’s work. Though she started off as many
other roots musicians quoting the gospel and making regular
allusions to Bible passages, in her most recent album ‘her
meditations center more on the historical, grounding her imagistic
landscape in events of significant cultural importance (the sinking
of the Titanic, the dust storms that blew in the Great Depression,
the assassination of Lincoln) as well as culling images from
America’s musical mythology,’ Baue writes. And, even though Welch
grew up in L.A., Baue argues that her adopted Appalachian sound is
just as authentic as if she’d grown up ‘in the shadow of the Clinch
Mountains of Virginia.’
–Sara V. Buckwitz
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