by Richie UnterbergerThe whole concept of a folkie with reasonable credibility doing an album of ski songs sounds like something that must have been foisted upon Gibson by the record company. Yet it was, in fact, entirely the idea of Gibson himself, a dedicated skier who was living in Aspen, CO at the time, and decided to do a musical about skiing. The musical never got produced, but this album did, comprised of folk-type songs with ski-themed lyrics that Gibson wrote, sometimes with the assistance of writers for the Denver Post. If not for the words, this would sound like a decent, if somewhat tame, typical late-'50s/early-'60s folk album. But because of lyrics about the "Ski Patrol," "Super Skier's Last Race," "Skiin' in the Mornin'," and even a "Talking Skier"-type talking folk song with a ski narrative, it inevitably comes off as kinda hokey and severely dated. It did feature more instrumentation than most folk albums of the era, the accompanists including Eric Weissberg (of later "Dueling Banjos" fame), bassist Russ Savakus (later to play on many notable folk and folk-rock albums of the '60s), and, most unusually, Joe Puma on electric guitar. This isn't pre-folk-rock, though; Puma's thin, echoey, jazzy figures are so subdued that he sounds like he's playing an amp with a mute button. It's ultimately a novelty album that doesn't serve Gibson's legacy well (and is certainly doubtful to be used as a ski soundtrack by jet setters nowadays), though Gibson said that in its time, it sold pretty well for an independent label folk LP.