Prospect Hill

Dom Flemons is a throwback of the first order, finding musical inspiration in the folk music of the mid-19th to mid-20th centuries. He continues this work here, on his second solo album and first since leaving The Carolina Chocolate Drops. A variety of musicians stop by to help him along, including bluesman Guy Davis. With enthusiasm for the material and conviction, Flemons is compelling enough to reach an audience that typically doesn’t listen to old-time music. *Prospect Hill* has a jug tune by Gus Cannon (“My Money Never Runs Out”), a hoedown-style take on Sonny Boy Williams’ “Polly Put the Kettle On,” and few other covers. But most of material comes from Flemons himself—notably the Dixieland jazz on the “’Til the Seas Run Dry,” the jump blues “I Can’t Do It Anymore,” the fife and drum of “Grotto Blues,” and the straight folk-blues of “Too Long (I’ve Been Gone).”

From a New Orleans jazz tribute to folk, it sounds as if Flemons is enjoying himself in this varied set