In a New Age

In a New Age
Studio album by Mickey Newbury
Released	1988
Recorded	Master's Touch Studio, Nashville, 1988
Genre	Country
Label	Airborne Records
Producer	Greg Humphrey
Mickey Newbury chronology
Sweet Memories (LP) (1985) In a New Age (1988) The Best of Mickey Newbury (1991)

Professional ratings
Review scores
Source	Rating
Allmusic	[1]

In a New Age was released in 1988, the first recording released by singer-songwriter Mickey Newbury since 1981's After All These Years. The album contains new versions of eight classic Newbury songs, with a full version of "All My Trials" which is part of Newbury's "An American Trilogy" (which is also included on the album.)

Background

In 1988, Airborne Records planned a release in which Newbury demos were treated with synthesizers and other then-contemporary production effects. These demos stemmed from sessions with producer Larry Butler in Nashville in March 1983 and featured new age synthesizer sounds, which Newbury came to loath. "I was so drunk then," he later explained. "I hate those cuts and never want to hear 'em again."^[2] Newbury also claimed to have thrown a cassette of the recording on the ground and stomped on it.^[3] Newbury was aghast when he heard that Airborne was planning to release the recordings, and had even printed up the album art, but, after learning that no CDs or cassettes had yet been made, Newbury instead re-recorded the songs Airborne planned to use, and the album was released with these new recordings, effectively Newbury's first recordings in years.^[4]

Newbury recorded the album with accompaniment from violinist Marie Rhines. The set includes Newbury classics "An American Trilogy", "San Francisco Mabel Joy", "Lovers", and "Cortelia Clark". "Poison Red Berries" was originally released as "I Don't Think About Her No More" on Looks Like Rain while "Willow Tree" was originally titled "Wish I Was" and released on His Eye Is on the Sparrow. Rhines later recalled:

When I arrived at the studio at 11AM, I remember it was quiet, no one around, except Mickey - who had set up two chairs in this big empty studio...I sat down, and then we began to play and never stopped until side one was done...We returned after a brief lunch, sat down and went through the exact order of side two never stopping the tape until we had finished the final song. Done. Mickey loved the results.^[5]

After recording had finished, Newbury convinced Larry Butler and Airborne to release his new version of the album instead, which they eventually agreed to do.^[6] Airborne did release the recordings Mickey rejected, also titled In a New Age, but had a Canadian distribution through CBS Music Products-catalogue No. ABK-61000. The title on the actual compact disc is printed A Legend In A New Age - one that Newbury initially rejected.^[7] The track title listing on the actual compact disc has the same order listing of the ACD-101 disc, but on the back the track listing is different. Such events only reinforced the songwriter's growing mistrust of the music business.

In 1999, In a New Age was revised by Newbury's label Mountain Retreat, bass, percussion, guitar, and sound effects were added.^[8] It was paired with a 1988 concert with accompaniment by violinist Rhines as part of a 2-CD set It Might As Well Be the Moon.

Reception

In a New Age did not chart. Wriitng in Goldmine in 1990, Allen Harbinson maintained that Newbury's vocal on "All My Trials" "has a naked, anguished beauty of the kind that make grown men weep." Tom Geddie of Buddy magazine declared the recordings were "too beautiful, too dark, and too reverent for today's cynical society that seems to want candy-coated songs." Newbury biographer Joe Ziemer calls it "a masterpiece."^[9] AllMusic awards the album only two out of five stars, with Kurt Wolff commenting the tracks are "sweeter and less emotionally piercing than his Elektra recordings."

Track listing

All songs composed by Mickey Newbury unless otherwise indicated:

1. "All My Trials" (Traditional)
2. "Cortelia Clark"
3. "Willow Tree"
4. "The Sailor"
5. "Frisco Depot"
6. "Poison Red Berries"
7. "Lovers"
8. "San Francisco Mabel Joy"
9. "An American Trilogy" (Traditional; arranged by Mickey Newbury)

References

1. "In a New Age". Allmusic. Retrieved 2012-02-24.
2. Zeimer 2015, p. 213.
3. Zeimer 2015, p. 232.
4. "It Might as Well Be the Moon". Allmusic. Retrieved 2012-02-24.
5. Zeimer 2015, p. 229.
6. Zeimer 2015, p. 230.
7. Zeimer 2015, p. 227.
8. "Mickey Newbury Store". Mickeynewbury.com. Retrieved 2012-02-24.
9. Zeimer 2015, p. 228.