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Alison Krauss and Robert Plant: hairdos that match, voices that soar

I once dated a woman who was a bluegrass fan. Of course, when she mentioned it, I promptly said,

“I love bluegrass!” although the only thing I knew was that it involved banjos and fiddles and pickin’ and grinnin’. (My daddy was a Hee Haw fan.) The next day, I headed to a music store to get a best-of-bluegrass CD and actually enjoyed quite a bit of it, especially the tracks by Alison Krauss.

The girlfriend is long gone, but Alison Krauss still turns my head from time to time. In fact, the

Cold Mountain soundtrack, to which she contributed, is on my iPod. As is Led Zeppelin IV. As a result, I once had a shuffle mode moment in which “Stairway to Heaven” followed “You Will Be My Ain True Love.” It wasn’t exactly a natural progression.

So when I heard that Robert Plant and Alison Krauss had made an album together, I thought it was a joke. But trust me, Raising Sand is no joke.

As unlikely as the pairing is, it works. The two voices come together in a way I didn’t expect — the sound is neither bluegrass nor rock and roll, but you can hear the influence of both. The songs are familiar — covers of Tom Waits, the Everly Brothers, Sam Phillips and more, including one by Jimmy Page/Robert Plant. One of my favorites is the

Townes Van Zandt song, “Nothin’,” which combines Plant’s Zeppelin-like guitar and Krauss’ country fiddle to remarkable effect. And I’ve listened to “Polly Come Home” at least five times today — it is very reminiscent of Led Zeppelin, but much more haunting. You can preview the entire recording on the album’s website.

Grammy Award winner T-Bone Burnett produced Raising Sand and plays guitar on 10 of its 13 tracks. This “making of” video with Plant, Krauss and Burnett lets us glimpse the chemistry between the three musicians that made this recording so magical.

Robert Plant and Alison Krauss will be featured guests on NPR’s World CafĂ© Live on Nov. 22 between 2:00 and 3:00 p.m. ET. No word yet on a tour, but if Plant and Krauss come to town, I’ll be there.

Have you listened to Raising Sand? What do you think of this pairing?

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