Tim Grimm - Holding Up The World (2008)

“Holding Up The World” is the fifth solo release by Tim Grimm in this past decade. Like the others preceding it, this recording is flavored by it’s rural Midwest birthplace. Grimm knows this part of the country well, it’s terrain and it’s people. The production is simple and familiar to those who are aware of Grimm’s body of work. He records his songs “live” with guitar and vocal, and then layers instruments and voices to suit the song. Occasionally, he’ll use a full “roots” band, but on this recording it’s usually more stark.

Utilizing his good friend Jason Wilber (John Prine Band) on electric guitar, banjo and on one track, piano, Grimm draws the listener in with his well-crafted story songs. Most of the players hail from Indiana—Corazong artist, Kristta Detor, Jan Lucas, Jennie Devoe and others. Thematically, “Holding Up The World” is a further examination of what it means to be human—in this case at the core of the songs are anguish, uncertainty, and yearning. There runs through these songs the thread that we all carry burdens with us—physical, emotional and spiritual. Musings on the notion of God returning to the earth and living amongst us. Flood victims dealing with their devastation and a love that holds them together.

A former slave escaping the south in the mid 1800’s with her children…Okies making their way out of the dust bowl in the 1940’s…A elderly farmer lamenting the loss of the family farm (his own and in the bigger picture, Midwest America’s)…An American veteran just back from Iraq, coming to grips with where he has been and what he has done…These are some of the tales that Grimm tells on this record. They are in some ways a mirror of our humanity told through the lens of a very thoughtful and empathetic Americana storyteller.