August 26, 2024
Scott Foley, purveyor of dust
The tentpole in the thirty year career of Gillian Welch & David Rawlings is a 2020 tornado that caused great damage to their Woodland studios. They had purchased the East Nashville facilities a couple years previous, after it had served as the setting for several seminal roots records, including Will the Circle Be Unbroken. The duo rescued their tapes, and expressed their gratitude with a generous rush of releases contained in their phenomenal Boots series. Their first collection of originals since the pandemic, Woodland continues in the spirit of Welch's previous work, but finds them opening their sound in previously unheard ways. With Rawlings taking the somewhat rare lead, "What We Had" strikes like a 70s Neil Young cut, with strings and percussion. Ketch Secor adds fiddle to "Day the Mississippi Died", featuring a loose and expressive vocal from Welch: I'm so disappointed in me and you / We can't even argue, so what else can we do. While not necessarily lush, several tracks deliver a slightly fuller arrangement. The bluesy "Empty Trainload Of Sky" drives on an undercurrent of soul, as does "Here Stands a Woman". From "Trainload": For a moment I was tempted to fly / To the Devil or the Lord / As it hung there like a sword / Just an empty trainload of sky. Welch and Rawlings have always been best when they create their songs from bits and pieces of plainspoken tradition, even as they speak to current realities. An album highlight, "Hashtag" beautifully memorializes longtime supporter Guy Clark, with strings and french horn: You said time makes the wheels spin / And the years roll out and the doubt rolls in / In the truck stops and the parking lots / And the cheap motels. The duo don't redefine their sound on Woodland, though the collection sounds more fresh, more emotionally invested. Welch and Rawlings trade lines on "Howdy Howdy": We've been together since I don't know when / And the best part's where one starts and the other ends.
--------------------------
Andrew Combs, Dream Pictures (Combs, Aug 23)
Andrew Combs writes from a corner table, chin in hand, a drink nearby, perhaps with unanswered texts on his phone. While he's largely claimed by the americana crowd, the singer-songwriter shares qualities with a less theatrical Father John Misty or Joe Henry than with a crowd of strummers or fireside cowboy hats. On his sixth LP, he once again collaborates with multi-instrumentalist Dominic Billett, with pedal steel maestro Spencer Cullum contributing throughout, creating sound portraits awash in melancholy. If you left a kiss / I must have missed it Combs sings on "I'm Fine", exploring his upper register. A fine singer, he executes lines like a jazz singer at times, more committed to communicating emotional nuance than vocal perfection. "Heavy the Heart" betrays a sweetness, while the title cut portrays Combs as a classic pop crooner. Combs and Billett arrange their songs on a framework of keys and piano, tipping between classic and contemporary, with Cullum's expressive pedal steel capably splitting the difference. A tone of timeless pop characterizes the flirty "Mary Gold": You played the wall so well / Now come be a flower. True to its name, Dream Pictures treats songs like "Your Eyes and Me" and "To Love" with a wash of watery color, suggesting surreal, late-evening scenes, with the latter cloaking Combs' delivery in adventurous reverb a'la Bon Iver. On "Sea In Me", the singer confesses We weren't happy Were we, babe, while "Table For Blue" is delivered from the perspective of a dishwasher captivated by a beautiful woman alone at a table. We've followed Andrew Combs since his classy 2015 debut, a songwriter with an original artistry and an efficient expression of genuine emotion. His new collection will be a perfect soundtrack for giving into a rainy evening.
--------------------------
No comments:
Post a Comment