Artist:     Jim Pharis

Album:     High Mileage

Label:     Independent

Release Date:     6.30.18

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BUY PHYSICAL

No matter what the odometer says, High Mileage runs like a dream. As humble and unpretentious as the old truck on its cover, the quiet, dependable set of acoustic blues covers and originals from Jim Pharis, an understated master of slow fingerpicking, takes its own sweet time getting from place to place.

In no particular hurry, Pharis adopts a simple, uncluttered approach to country-blues guitar embroidery, efficiently and effortlessly plucking away in unfurnished atmospheres as spare and empty as any abandoned house. The only accompaniment comes from the likeable, downhome harmonica bleed of A.J. Primeaux, and those occasions are few and far between.

Otherwise, Pharis is all by his lonesome, shucking and jiving his way through a title track that has a light bounce in its step and ruminating about mortality in a meditative “Drift Away” without sounding like the grim reaper is breathing down his neck. This isn’t Ralph Stanley’s bleak “O Death,” after all. Both originals showcase the deft touch and pristine nuance inherent in Pharis’ playing, as well as the wobbly weariness and weathered quality of his vocals. An elegant reworking of Sister Rosetta Tharpe’s “Up Above My Head I Hear Music in the Air” is joyful, yet restrained, and a shining gem on High Mileage, although the haunted “Salt and Pearls” crawls along ponderously and deliberately before unceremoniously giving out.

High Mileage rarely disappoints, however, as its rural, DIY charm and nimble guitar work ultimately win the day. What a lovely drive down a lonely, unpaved road.

—Peter Lindblad