Music from Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus

• Artist: Jim White
• Rating:
• Release Date: June 07, 2005
• Type: Soundtrack
• Genre: Folk

Review

British director Andrew Douglas was so taken with Jim White's 1997 Southern gothic road record Wrong-Eyed Jesus that he decided to make a movie about the Deep South with White leading the charge in an old Chevy Impala. Dreamlike, spooky, and often funny, Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus is a series of collages and testimonies on everything from Pentecostal churches to old juke joints with music from a familiar cast of Americana underworld characters peppered throughout. White offers up three atmospheric tracks, one from his lauded debut and two from its follow-up, the bluesy and equally vast No Such Place. In fact, atmosphere is the common thread here, with brooding tracks from familial Chicago duo the Handsome Family ("My Sister's Tiny Hands") and Cat Power ("Crossbones Style") and hellfire and brimstone from the mercurial David Eugene Edwards of 16 Horsepower, who offers up a chilling field recording of "Wayfaring Stranger." Old-timey classics from Doc Watson and Clarence Ashley ("Coo Coo Bird") as well as an eerie version of "Amazing Grace" played on the saw by Melissa Swingle round out a soundtrack that matches its subject with equal parts reverence and obsession. Like the yang to O Brother, Where Art Thou?'s yin, it resonates -- but uncomfortably. ~ James Christopher Monger, All Music Guide

Tracks

Track Title	Composers	Performers	Time
Everything Was Stories		Harry Crews	(:28)
Still Waters	Jim White	Jim White	(6:36)
My Sister's Tiny Hands	Brett Sparks	The Handsome Family	(3:27)
Crossbones Style	Chan Marshall	Cat Power	(4:32)
The Last Kind Words	Geeshie Wiley	David Johansen, Larry Saltzman	(4:10)
The Wound That Never Heals	Jim White	Jim White	(4:25)
Wayfaring Stranger	Traditional	David Eugene Edwards	(3:30)
Small Town (Lyrics)			(:21)
Black Soul Choir [Live]	David Eugene Edwards	16 Horsepower	(3:09)
Little Maggie [Live]	Traditional	Lee Sexton	(2:28)
First There Was		Maggie Brown, Johnny Dowd	(5:02)
Coo Coo Bird	Traditional	Doc Watson, Clarence Ashley	(2:32)
Amazing Grace	Traditional	Melissa Swingle	(2:05)
Christmas Day	Jim White	Jim White	(7:11)
Essential Truth		Jim White	(1:19)

Credits

Harry Smiths (Engineer), Andrew Douglas (Photography), David Johansen (Arranger), Scott Hull (Mastering), Yale Evelev (Executive Producer), Hugh Mitchell Dawson (Remixing), Brian Koonin (Arranger), Martin Jack Rosenbaum (Photography), David Johansen (Engineer)