Henhouse Prowlers

Bluegrass has branched off in some pretty unlikely directions over the last decade, as tie-dyed fans have reimagined the genre as a rustic form of jam music and a handful of punk-leaning outfits have sped up the genre's already fast tempos to dizzying extremes. Chicago's Henhouse Prowlers, though, play their bluegrass straight. They're such traditionalists that they all perform huddled around a single microphone, just like the bluegrass pioneers of the '20s and '30s, and they pride themselves on their clean-cut appearance, wearing crisp suits at each show. The group's latest album is <i>Verses, Chapters and Rhymes</i>, which they recorded in Colorado with one of the modern bluegrass scene's most celebrated dobro players, Sally Van Meter.