Following the release of a particularly playful and breezy tenth solo album,
Heartmind, in 2022, style-assimilating singer/songwriter
Cass McCombs teamed up with childhood friend
Greg Gardner to record a set of children's songs that
Gardner had written and stockpiled. A preschool teacher known as
Mr. Greg,
Gardner's songs were penned with age- and classroom-appropriate instruction in mind and touch on topics ranging from foreign languages ("Friends from All Around the World," Hello and Goodbye versions) and animals ("I'm a Nocturnal Animal") to recycling ("Things That Go in the Recycling Bin") and vocations ("J-O-B").
McCombs stepped up with arrangements that incorporate musical styles as diverse as the subject matter, and, as the title suggests, they together performed the 20 songs that comprise
Mr. Greg & Cass McCombs Sing and Play New Folk Songs for Children. Any fans of
McCombs expecting the anodyne may be pleased to learn that, while nothing here is exactly psychedelic or irreverent (although "Roll Around Downtown" warns us to keep an eye out for cops),
McCombs gets into the carefree spirit of the songs with efficient but freewheeling arrangements that touch on reggae ("J-O-B"), traditional country ("Each One of Us"), rockabilly ("Roll Around Downtown"), and more, along with plenty of folk. Also setting the album apart from a lot of children's music are songs like "Requiem for Ruth Bader Ginsburg," an earnest bluegrass outing that doubles as a biographic overview and lesson on integrity. Also included alongside subject matter like "My Skull Is Made Out of Bone" and "Paper Airplane" is the pure folk entry "Wave a Flag for Harvey Milk" ("A flag that stands for love, made of rainbow-colored silk"), which encourages advocacy and the celebration of differences. A handful of the songs here invite children into the room, such as those who offer up their opinions on "What's Your Favorite Kind?" Perhaps the closest thing to a conventional folk-pop song is the jaunty "Together with You," while the
Cochran-inflected "Little Wilma Wiggly Worm" opens the album with a tuneful rocker. The influence of such socially conscious kids' songwriters as
Ella Jenkins and
Woody Guthrie is evident on
Mr. Greg & Cass McCombs Sing and Play New Folk Songs for Children, and as if to underscore its smart, compassionate folk cred,
Smithsonian Folkways came on board to release the album. ~ Marcy Donelson
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