Sometimes I think of folk songs as these mischievous fae beings, lithesexy watercolor sprites with elf ears and pointy teeth. I say this because they have the power to totally derail any rational but story-obsessed mundane with a rapturous tune, intrigue, and glittering, dreamy promises of a fascinating song lineage just waiting to be uncovered. That is, if one has access to the Internet and a couple of hours to spare.

I don’t speak from experience or anything. No, not at all. What, me waste time?

Time has been so short for me over the last couple of months that I all but forgot about the stacks of folk music that hang on a shelf just above my second writing desk (in the studio proper), probably because I barely lifted my head between August and December. But I do make time for magazines even when I don’t have any (time, that is), so I read the feature on Karen Dalton in the latest BUST, then promptly forgot about it until it was time to download this month’s Emusic tracks. I had to nab her recently re-released IN MY OWN TIME because, yes, my folk-of-the-obscure cred is something that I actively maintain (or at least try to maintain) while at the same time pretending to be all nonchalant about it. And I had never heard of Karen Dalton.

As to the album itself, well, I see why all the boys were into her. For me, the jury’s still out. The voice is really a make-or-break thing for me and I haven’t quite embraced hers, shall we say. And she has some goddess-awful selections on this thing (”How Sweet It Is”? what the fudge?). But she also has some real jems, including an old (and yes, obscure) thing from the Revolution called “Katie Cruel”.

“Katie Cruel” has that thing going on whereby the lyrics really don’t make a ton of sense, yet coupled with the tune, they convey the mood perfectly. The story is only a skeleton, or a frame — not enough to stand on its own, but just seductive enough to get one’s brain itching to fill in the gaps. Also, it’s from the North (the American Heritage Songbook notes a family in Vermont at the turn of the century as its source, though it’s gotta be way older than that if that thing about the Revolutionary War soldiers dancing to it is to be believed). I don’t know (or hear) much about the history of New England folk songs, so that’s kind of a treat.

For some reason, “Katie Cruel” reminds me of “Nottamun Town,” another beautiful, bizarre song, standing proud on mere story bones. Bert Jansch does my favorite version of that one; you can hear it on my folk mixtape if I haven’t taken it down (I can’t remember).

Come to think of it, Jansch does “Katie Cruel” on his very latest CD, called THE BLACK SWAN. It’s a duet with Beth Orton, I think. You can get that on Emusic, too.