It’s 2009, and the arrival of a new Flatlanders album just isn’t quite the event it was back at the beginning of the decade. And that’s a good thing. Their 2002 reunion album Now Again was a fun, anything-goes affair that found Lubbock expats Butch Hancock, Jimmie Dale Gilmore and Joe Ely doing their best to sound unburdened by the weight of 30 years’ worth of “more-a-legend-than-a-band” mystique. But it still felt like a super-group summit masquerading as a down-to-earth song-swap — miles removed from the ethereal, quiet beauty of their 1972 debut, recorded long before Hancock, Gilmore and Ely became legends of Texas folk, country and rock ’n’ roll. Wheels of Fortune, which followed quickly in 2004, was a victory lap offering more of the same, albeit with better songs (as befits an encore). Both albums were a blast, but after watching the Flatlanders become the Fleetwood Mac of Americana, it was kind of a relief to see them refocus their energies on their solo careers.
Which brings us now, five years later, to Hills and Valleys. On the surface, not much has changed — but there’s just something about this go-round that feels altogether more relaxed and natural, like a record made on holiday by three guys with nothing left to prove to themselves or anybody else. Free of expectations, they casually spin off real magic. The opening, Ely-sung “Homeland Refugee” isn’t just the best song ever recorded under the Flatlanders name; it could be the best song any of them have ever had a hand in writing, period — a Woody Guthrie-worthy, state-of-the-nation elegy for the American dream. That’s a tough act to follow, but Gilmore’s elegantly wistful “After the Storm,” Hancock’s better-than-the-title-lets-on “Thank God for the Road” and the lively cover of Flatlander son Colin Gilmore’s gleeful “The Way We Are” all come close. As befits the album title, there’s filler here, too, but even lesser songs like “Just About Time” (a by-the-numbers exercise in “everybody-take-a-verse-and-come-together-on-the-chorus”) get by on good humor, spirit and the superb production of Flatlander ringer Lloyd Maines. Ely, Gilmore and Hancock should each top this with future solo releases, but right here and now, they all sound — to borrow a line from Now Again — right where they belong.
