Great Lakes songs are made of hard work, hard living, hard weather, ships that go down and ships that come in. Freshwater Highway has so much genuine history, so much variety in the arrangements, and such respect for the material that this disc has earned a place among those most listenable few we keep in a little crate next to the CD drive to lighten the more tedious computer chores. Murdock obviously lavished thoughtful preparation and research on this album of traditional and contemporary Great Lakes chanteys, songs, and ballads.
Credit is given to some of the most highly regarded authorities on the Lake Sailors and their music.
Demonstrating his dedication to the preservation of contemporary Lakes lore, the modern lyrics are so appropriately chosen that you can't tell without the liner notes the traditional songs from the new. There's an amazing timelessness in this music that's not disturbed by the juxtaposition of Murdock's original song about the loss of the Coast Guard buoy tender Mesquite and Stephen Foster's Glendy Burke. A competent ensemble of folk instruments accompany both songs. The Ghost of Red Monroe, sung unaccompanied for two or three verses gradually accepts the support of a minimal guitar commentary. The arrangement couldn't be more appropriate for this long ballad's retelling of the sinking of the lake ship Chicago Board of Trade.