ROUTES & BRANCHES
featuring the very best of americana, alt.country and roots music
July 14, 2024
Scott Foley, purveyor of dust
The popular t-shirt that once read Who the fuck is Sturgill Simpson now reads Who the fuck is Johnny Blue Skies. The Kentucky icon has kept to his word, releasing just five albums under his own name (following the traditional Christian narrative of the journey of the human soul), plus a couple bluegrass projects that Simpson is not counting. In a worthwhile GQ piece, he shovels dirt on his one-time identity: Sturgill served his purpose, but he's dead, he's gone, and I'm definitely not that guy anymore. The article largely sets the stage for Simpson's first full-length Johnny Blue Skies record, Passage du Desir (High Top Mt), describing how the artist left America for Thailand, and then Paris, how engaging his wanderlust gave him space to address his lifelong depression, isolation, and temptation. The author quotes Margo Price: He burns bridges to follow his heart.
When Sturgill Simpson released Metamodern Sounds In Country Music in May 2014, a bomb was dropped on our kind of music. While his High Top Mountain was very widely praised the previous year, Metamodern Sounds struck an iconoclastic chord, arguably paving the way for the next decade of progressive country music (not to mention earning the top spot in our year-end favorites). While Simpson continued to push the envelope for 2016's Sailor's Guide To Earth, and all but abandoned country music altogether with 2019's Sound & Fury, and while he earned a reputation for raging in the face of the status quo, nothing since has dealt the same blow as Metamodern Sounds.
Passage du Desir is not Metamodern Sounds, though in spirit and in scope and the collection's eight songs share more in common with that record than with any other in Simpson's catalog, even as it's also sonically the least ambitious LP. The album opens in a lovely cloud of accordion and fiddle before slipping into "Swamp Of Sadness", the singer adrift in nautical metaphors: A drunken sailor, lost and lonely in a sad and magic swamp. A bluesy malaise, "Swamp" applies a light touch to the arrangement, the singer's delivery similarly low key as he wanders the Paris streets in his desire to shake the haze: Trying to break the cycle of solitude and sin / Here come those sirens again. Simpson's delivery is unexpectedly soulful on "If the Sun Never Rises Again", his expressive guitar setting an edge to a song that otherwise cleaves to satisfyingly smooth 70s a.m. radio: Sometimes beginnings can come from an end, he sings.
2021's Ballad Of Dood & Juanita delivered on the call for a more standard country collection. Nothing on Passage du Desir matches that session's nod to trad, though a couple moments lean more into that wind. Simpson name-drops Thai locales in "Scooter Blues", finding relief in the country's surf, sand, and haunts (at one point rhyming Eggos, Legos, and hasta luego). Dan Dugmore's pedal steel is immediately grounding on one of the record's more upbeat moments, balancing a laid-back Jimmy Buffett/JJ Cale vibe with Simpson's existential lyrics: When people say 'Are you him' / I'll say 'Not anymore' ... "Who I Am" likewise finds comfort and clarity in change, adding familiar six-string twang to a easily loping country number that continues to inquire about identity: I've lost everything I am / Even my name. "Mint Tea" falls into this country lane, earning props for the line, Need an early morning matcha / Girl I gotcha.
Produced by Sturgill Simpson and David R Ferguson, Passage is the artist's best sounding session to date, opting for less indulgent, more efficient arrangements. Rather than gathering his touring outfit, Simpson convenes a similarly sharp team of Fred Eltringham (drums), Mike Rojas (keys), Jake Bugg (acoustic), and Steve Mackey (bass), with help from Sierra Ferrell, Dugmore and others. Results are warm and well-balanced, even on the record's more expansive moments. Closing Passage is the nine-minute "One For the Road", half of which is an extended instrumental outro. What if I told you / I'm not the man that you think I am Simpson asks, the song growing with Matt Combes' dramatic strings. The highlight of Passage du Desir is the gorgeous "Jupiter's Faerie", an admission of guilt and regret in the wake of a former friend's suicide. Restrained piano-based verses swell to an almost anthemic chorus replete with strings and an ambient swoosh.
Josh Tillman became Father John Misty. More recently, Mike & the Moonpies wisely opted to shift to the more mature Silverada. Sturgill Simpson's adoption of the Johnny Blue Skies marquee isn't the main point of Passage du Desir, though issues of identity are central. Given space by his unfortunate ruptured vocal chords in '21, Simpson seems to have reconsidered the terms of his fame, free to call his own next move, liberated from expectations to the point where his strongest ambition is a desire to be honest. He sings, There's some days I ain't okay / And there's some nights I just want to die, then later: There's no happy endings / Only stories that stop before they're through. Sturgill Simpson's new collection doesn't resolve too many existential issues, but it's as comfortable as he's sounded in ages. Passage du Desir won't wow listeners with its invention or its reach, but it serves as a reset for one of our most essential artists, offering a great place to land if only for a moment, one of the year's strongest albums.
ROUTES-cast July 14, 2024
^ Johnny Blue Skies, "Jupiter's Faerie" Passage du Desir (High Top Mt, 24) D
- Orville Peck, "Death Valley High (ft Beck)" Stampede Vol 2 (Warner, Aug 2)
- Zach Bryan, "Memphis; the Blues (ft John Moreland)" Great American Bar Scene (Beltin' Bronco, 24)
- Muscadine Bloodline, "Tickets To Turnpike (ft Kyle Nix)" Coastal Plain (Stancaster, Aug 16) D
- Cassandra Lewis, "Hold the Door" Lost In a Dream (Low Country Sound, 24)
- David Newbould, "Sin & Redemption (live)" Live In Germany (Blackbird, 24)
- Karen Jonas, "Four Cadillacs" Rise and Fall Of American Kitsch (Yellow Brick, Aug 9)
- Steve Earle, "Transcendental Blues (live)" Alone Again ... Live (Howe Sound, 24)
- Rainy Eyes, "Little Dream" Lonesome Highway (Royal Potato Family, 24)
- Deslondes, "I'll Do It" Roll It Out (New West, Sep 6)
- Jade Jackson, "You" Silent Wings EP (Bitchin', 24)
- Jeremie Albino, "Rolling Down the 405" Our Time In the Sun (Concord, Nov 1) D
- Merce Lemon, "Backyard Lover" Watch Me Drive Them Dogs Wild (Darling, Sep 27) D
- Tim Heidecker, "Well's Running Dry" Slipping Away (Bloodshot, Oct 18) D
- Steve Wynn, "Making Good On My Promises" Make It Right (Fire, Aug 30)
- Dead Tongues, "Where Love All Happened" I Am a Cloud (Psychic Hotline, Aug 9)
- Matthew Logan Vasquez, "Theatre" Frank's Full Moon Saloon Pt 2 (MLV, 24) D
- Futurebirds, "Feel Less Bad" Easy Company (Dualtone, Aug 9)
- Deer Tick, "Big Black Hearse" Contractual Obligations EP (ATO, 24)
- The Dip, "Head On a Swivel" Love Direction (Dualtone, 24)
- Cold Specks, "How It Feels" single (Mute, 24) D
- Amy Helm, "Money On 7" Silver City (Sun, Sep 6) D
- Sam Blasucci, "Love Come Down" single (Innovative Leisure, 24) D
- Donovan Woods, "When Our Friends Come Over (ft Madi Diaz)" Things Were Never Good If They're Not Good Now (End Times, 24)
- Maya de Vitry, "If They Feel Like Wings" The Only Moment (Mad Maker, 24)
- Jake Xerxes Fussell, "When I'm Called" When I'm Called (Fat Possum, 24)
- Aoife O'Donovan & Hawktail, "America, Come" Play All My Friends EP (Yep Roc, Aug 16) D
- Jesse Welles, "Genocide Cake" Hells Welles (Welles, 24)
- Amy Annelle, "East Texas Son" The Toll (High Plains Sigh, Aug 2)
- Bella White, "Nobody Dies Anymore" Five For Silver EP (Rounder, Aug 16)
We'll visit A Routes & Branches Guide To Feeding Your Monster for a quick look at what's on the new music horizon. An essential LA punk band since their 1977 inception, X have decided to release one final record. The Fat Possum label has planned Smoke & Fiction for an August 2nd unveiling. Roots-pop Singer-songwriter Andrew Combs is joined in studio by Spencer Cullum for his next project. Expect Dream Pictures on August 23rd. Ten years after its initial release, Lydia Loveless will revisit her Somewhere Else record. Under the name Something Else, the original songs are stripped back and rerecorded on piano (Bloodshot, Aug 23). Founding member of Old Crow Medicine Show, Willie Watson has released a pair of albums celebrating traditional folksongs. He has announced a September 13 release for his first original LP, a self-titled affair (Little Operation). Finally, Jeremie Albino's 2023 Tears You Hide was a revelation. The Canadian songwriter has announced a follow-up, Our Time In the Sun, due November 1st on Easy Eye Sound.
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