featuring the very best of americana, alt.country and roots music
June 23, 2024
Scott Foley, purveyor of dust
How do we keep track of all the americana, alt.country and/or roots music records that are released during any given year? Like many others, we look to A Routes & Branches Guide To Feeding Your Monster, our fervently updated calendar for new and forthcoming albums. Since we last checked, New West Records has announced a posthumous collection of Justin Townes Earle music. All In: Unreleased & Rarities features unheard demos, covers, and other tracks from throughout his time with the label (Aug 9). Few artists check the country-soul box as capably as Shelby Lynne. She's set an August 16 date for her next full-length, Consequences Of the Crown (Monument). Following a collection of Dylan covers, The Cactus Blossoms return to original songs with their next project. Every Time I Think About You drops August 30 on the Walkie Talkie label. New Orleans' Deslondes have readied their third collection of country and R&B. Roll It Out will be rolled out September 6 on New West Records. Jeffrey Foucault has migrated to Fluff & Gravy for his first record in six years. Universal Fire will land on shelves on September 6.
A few months ago, the Psychic Hotline label announced that Ryan Gustafson would be releasing two full-length Dead Tongues LPs before summer's end. The first of those, Body Of Light, has just dropped, with the second, I Am a Cloud, planned for August. The North Carolina songwriter's sound is a somewhat insular desert-folk, as heard most recently on a very good trio of albums: Unsung Passage (2018), Transmigration Blues (2020), and Dust (2022). Each of these projects seems to have arrived following a time of soul-searching, a questioning of personal and professional purpose. For the new double Dead Tongues collection, Gustafson entered the studio with the intention of opening his creative process to the messy forces of collaboration.
Body Of Light features an ensemble that includes musicians who have worked with Twain, Wye Oak, Califone, Mountain Goats and others. Baby there ain't no rules here / We can just slide, Gustafson declares on the opening title cut: You don't need to show up / The same way each time. What starts with his quavering vocal and acoustic guitar progressively gives room to a warm breeze of sound: Backing chorus, woodwinds, manipulated murmurs. "Body Of Light" is a lovely, carefully built entry into the sessions, a slow blossoming that reveals the most open, out-reaching expression of Gustafson's career. While Dead Tongues records have always included outside contributors, a handful of these new songs recall the heartland roots-rock of War On Drugs.
Case in point, "Dirt For a Dying Sun" might be the largest Dead Tongues song to date, replete with train whistle harmonica and Mat Davidson's pedal steel. Gustafson delivers his vocal with abandon, a piercing electric guitar launches a solo into the reverberating arrangement: Just two blocks down / There's a factory cloud that's / Burning a hole in the sky / In the heartbeat of the night. "Dreamer" is bright and melodic, Jenn Wasner's supporting vocals adding a colorful accent as Ryan Gustafson's lyric eloquently suggests a scene: A two room shack / With the windows blacked out / Toward the road / Roof leaked and the lights hummed. Even when dealing with the memory of loss, as on the Mazzy Star-esque "Fading Away", Dead Tongues sound loose and wide-open, instrumentally more expansive than on past projects.
Ryan Gustafson creates beautiful music that connects elements of the emotional landscape to detailed accounts of the physical surroundings. More sober moments of Body Of Light deploy these pastoral tendencies gorgeously. The poetry of the acoustic "Daylilly" plays like a watercolor: Cactus blossom / Dusty summer haze / Desert rain done / Washed out that highway. On the steadily percolating "Hard Times Sore Eyes" it's a still-life: Found snake skin / In my bedroom / With the sea glass and driftwood / Dried flowers and polaroids. The latter half of the session dwells in this contemplative space, more familiar to listeners of Dead Tongues. "Moonshadow" paints with a chorus of supporting voices and echoing electric guitar strings, a song dense with sound and imagery.
The singer shares, When I forget myself / Is when I feel free. Even when Gustafson nears Israel Nash's sonic territory, he can't leave behind this spirit of introspection. Even when he offered his songs to the gathered musicians for input and collaboration, he had already spent time holed away, poring over his work. Body Of Light brings welcome new shades to the Dead Tongues palette, but at heart the sessions succeed on virtue of Ryan Gustafson's initial vision. Like early Hiss Golden Messenger there's an element of mysticism to his art: This is just about / Everything I know from being alive, he sings on "Moonshadow." Nothing is certain / And everything's changing all the time / And our time / Goes by.
We eagerly await I Am a Cloud, the second part of this project, on August 9th.
ROUTES-cast June 23, 2024
^ Dead Tongues, "Fading Away" Body Of Light (Psychic Hotline, 24)
- Deer Tick, "Sacrosanct" Contractual Obligations EP (ATO, Jul 12) D
- Carson McHone, "(Lying Here With) Linda On My Mind" Odes EP (Merge, Jul 19)
- Why Bonnie, "Fake Out" Wish On the Bone (Fire Talk, Aug 30) D
- Torres & Fruit Bats, "Married For Love" A Decoration EP (Merge, Aug 9) D
- Andrew Combs, "Eventide" Dream Pictures (Combs, Aug 23) D
- Maya de Vitry, "Odds Of Getting Even" Only Moment (Mad Maker, Jul 12) D
- Massy Ferguson, "So Long Carry On" You Can't Tell Me I'm Not What I Used To Be (North & Left, 24) D
- AJ Lee & Blue Summit, "I Can't Find You At All (ft Molly Tuttle)" City Of Glass (Signature Sounds, Jul 19)
- Willie Watson, "Real Love" Willie Watson (Little Operation, Sep 13) D
- Cactus Blossoms, "Every Time I Think Of You" Every Time I Think Of You (Walkie Talkie, Aug 30)
- Tommy Prine, "Holding On To More" This Far South (Deluxe) (Nameless Knight, 24) D
- Reckless Kelly, "Keep Lookin' Down the Road" single (No Big Deal, 24) D
- Goodnight Texas, "Lightning and the Old Man Todd" Signals (2 Cent Bank Check, Jul 19)
- Jana Mila, "Chameleon" Chameleon (New West, Aug 30)
- Jason Hawk Harris, "Give Myself To You" Breakkup Songs Are Love Songs Too Vol 1 EP (Bloodshot, 24)
- Dori Freeman, "Shores Of America" Proxy Music (StorySound, 24) D
- Pony Bradshaw, "Ginseng Daddy" Thus Spoke the Fool (Soundly, Aug 16) D
- Amanda Anne Platt & Honeycutters, "Big Year" The Ones That Stay (Mule Kick, Aug 9)
- Sadler Vaden, "Two Balloons" Dad Rock EP (Dirty Mag, 24)
- Jade Jackson, "One Man Woman" single (Bitchin', 24) D
- Tim Easton, "Fly Your Flag High" Let's Go Dancing: Celebration Of Kevn Kinney (Tasty Goody, 24)
- Sophie Gault, "Lately (ft Gabe Lee)" Baltic Street Hotel (Strong Place, Sep 20)
- Dave Alvin & Jimmie Dale Gilmore, "Broke Down Engine" TexiCali (Yep Roc, 24)
- Angela Autumn, "Boot Song" single (Autumn, 24) D
- Rob Baird, "High Road (ft Ruston Kelly)" Burning In the Stars (Hard Luck, 24) D
- Marty Stuart, "I Need To Know" Petty Country (Big Machine, 24)
- Morgan Wade, "Moth To a Flame" Obsessed (Ladylike, Aug 16)
- Shelby Lynne, "Butterfly" Consequences Of the Crown (Monument, Aug 16)
- Mavis Staples, "Worthy" single (Anti, 24) D
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To enjoy our weekly Spotify ROUTES-cast, just open Spotify and search for "routesandbranches" to access this most recent playlist, as well as many others from past months. Or click here for a preview:
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