Hard Choices

Album Review

This is Common Ground's first album on CD, when they were still calling themselves Cheryl Cloud and Common Ground. It was released in 1994, the year Cheryl earned the American Cancer Society's Courage Award for her work to increase cancer awareness, prior to her death in 1995. The album spans a wide range of emotions, drawn from the band members' experiences of the joys and challenges of life. On the upbeat side is "Playing Rock 'n' Roll" — a lively, rocking, country-flavored number written by Mark Cloud, about a blue-collar guy who moonlights in a band. Also in this collection, the Celtic instrumental "Wat Ye Wa I Met the Streen" was performed as a single cut, where in later albums, the band combines it in a medley with the cheerful vocal "Boys on Wheels," a popular favorite in live performances. The sadder and more pensive side of life is represented by Cheryl Cloud's original songs, "Dreams" and "Paper Clips and String," where Marcy Hogan's viola echos the melancholy mood. The title song is an outstanding performance — lyrical, moving, and blue. Another performance of note is "Hold on Tight," which shows determination to keep going, even against the odds. Cheryl Cloud wrote with great honesty and depth of feeling about the effects of cancer on her life, and left a legacy of song that Common Ground continued performing. Longtime fans will value this album for its presentation of Cheryl Cloud's performances of her own songs, while the collection also serves as an introduction for new and casual listeners to the band as it was in its earlier years, before Cheryl Cloud's death.