from The Tennessean (Music) on blogs.tennessean.com

Steve Martin doesn’t think it strange that he can excel at acting, comedy, novel writing, magic, art collecting and banjo playing. After all, he says, normal people excel at disparate activities.

“They raise kids, go to work, do all that stuff,” he says.

If Martin’s multitasking isn’t amazing in itself, then the skill level he achieves in each of those crafts is. The latest example: his second bluegrass album, Rare Bird Alert, released Tuesday on Rounder Records, which features ace acoustic band The Steep Canyon Rangers and guests Paul McCartney and the Dixie Chicks.

Filled with deft musicianship and inventive wordplay, the album would seem the product of a long life devoted to writing and recording music. The instrumentals are precisely constructed and performed, and Martin’s lyrics to “Best Love,” “Jubilation Day” and “Atheists Don’t Have No Songs” often offer an oblique, convention-tweaking humor that will remind longtime fans of some of his standup routines from the 1970s. (Another calling card from that period is here as well, as Martin and the Rangers present a banjo-laden version of Martin’s Top 20 comedy hit “King Tut.”) Martin does a little singing on the album, but he leaves most of the vocal duties to the Rangers and his guests.

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