Hear Alison Krauss and Robert Plant’s ‘High and Lonesome,’ New Album’s Only Original Song
Alison Krauss and Robert Plant's new album Raise the Roof is a record of covers, but they snuck one original into the mix. "High and Lonesome," which the pair shared on Thursday (Oct. 7), is a co-write between Plant and T Bone Burnett.
Burnett produced Raise the Roof for Krauss and Plant; he's also the producer behind the pair's first album together, 2007's Raising Sand. On "High and Lonesome," on which Burnett also plays electric guitar and mellotron and sings harmony vocals, has a dark blues sound; Krauss and Plant are backed by Dennis Crouch on bass, Jay Bellerose on percussion and Krauss' brother, Viktor Krauss, on mellotron.
Raise the Roof, due out on Nov. 19 via Rounder Records, features covers of songs from, among others, Lucinda Williams, the Everly Brothers and Merle Haggard. Says Krauss, "One of my favorite parts of this is the songs and songwriters that I had never heard of. Working with Robert, and with T Bone, is always a great education in music history."
Adds Plant of the project, "It's such a far cry from everything I've done before. I love the whole kaleidoscope of music that I've explored, but this is a place where you can think within the song, you can decide how to bring home an emotion. It's another blend that we've got, and long may we have more of them."
Krauss and Plant recorded Raise the Roof in Nashville in late 2019 and early 2020. They finished the album shortly before the COVID-19 pandemic shut down much of the world.
Raising Sand, Krauss and Plant's only other record together, won the pair six Grammy Awards in 2009, including the all-genre Album of the Year and Record of the Year honors. The platinum-certified project landed at No. 1 on the Billboard Top Rock Albums chart, and at No. 2 on the Top Country Albums chart and the all-genre Billboard 200.
In the country world specifically, Raising Sand won Krauss and Plant Musical Event of the Year at the CMA Awards. At the Americana Honors & Awards, they took home Album of the Year and Duo/Group of the Year.
Raise the Roof is available to pre-order and pre-save now at PlantKrauss.com. Krauss and Plant will reportedly tour together in 2022; full details are forthcoming.