ROUTES & BRANCHES  

featuring the very best of americana, alt.country and roots music

May 3, 2020

Scott Foley, purveyor of dust

For a time when the world is shuttered, there sure is a whole lot of music being made.  Much of it seems to be in the spirit of Hmm ... Long as I'm home, I might as well release a poorly recorded cover of a Radiohead song.  Our ROUTES-cast has always tended to be about proper albums, poking around full-length releases together, song-by-song until we have a better sense of what's going on.  I'll throw singles on the ROUTES-cast from time to time, especially if they're not COVID-themed.  But lately I've had to exercise a little more discernment than usual, figuring out which one-offs to represent on our Spotify playlists and which to leave on the back burner.  I still think thirty songs is just about right.  And I'd rather not knock the six or so older cuts from the list, just for the sake of making more room for new stuff.

And this week brought a healthy helping of releases that I would've been more than happy to write up.  The perennially reliable Damien Jurado's first full-length for Mama Bird Records; Andrew Bryant's follow-up to Ain't It Like the Cosmos; the unanticipated return of the original foursome behind the masterful early X releases.

But I decided several weeks ago to publish an appreciation of American Aquarium's new set, Lamentations, a collection that frontman BJ Barham tells us is about the things that break us as human beings.  Since 2010's Small Town Hymns, the Raleigh-based act has served as a mainstay on R&B playlists, through lineup changes and label hopping and solo records.  Through trials and tribulations of his own, Barham has been the reliable constant from album to album, maturing from fiery reflections on his own young life to his current status as a troubadour for the working class. 

If you want to know Barham's origin story, you can check out how he's passing much of his COVID isolation.  In addition to watching his fledgling mustache take shape, you can follow his daily acoustic tributes to artists who have inspired his own work.  More obvious nods to Petty, Prine and Lucero are alternated with heartfelt tributes to country classics like John Anderson even early Toby Keith.  Not to mention his indelible take on "Here Kitty Kitty" from Tiger King.  The takeaway from this exercise is that BJ Barham is a music lover who has done his homework.

Over the years, American Aquarium have shown a sort of restlessness with regards to selecting their producers. Their last handful of records have seen them team with Chris Stamey, Jason Isbell, Brad Cook and John Fullbright.  For Lamentations, Barham hands the producer's keys to Shooter Jennings, whose recent credits are impressive: Brandi Carlile, White Buffalo, Hellbound Glory, Jaime Wyatt and others. As heard on BJ Barham's 2016 solo set, Rockingham, the writer's work stands well without polish or extensive production.  But Jennings' touch on these new songs serves to raise American Aquarium to a new level of expression.

On the title cut, Barham sings of the day I woke up from the American dream, a cinematic rush of sound building beneath him.  Track the video down for this one, a striking piece that interweaves shots of the singer performing in a gutted room with footage of abandoned towns, factories and farms.  "Me + Mine (Lamentations)" largely sets the spirit for the collection, echoing the voice of the people stuck between the Left and Right, hard workers at the mercy of the markets they've served for generations.  As the tension builds to a breaking point, he sings: What are you supposed to do / When the god you're praying to / Up and goes missing.  The song's false ending ushers in two minutes of cascading piano and crashing, skydiving guitar, as the video erupts into a breathtaking montage of death and destruction.  These lamentations are gettin' too damn hard to sing ...

Following such an ambitious intro, Lamentations settles down a bit, sharp-focusing on those small moments with great repercussion.  "Six Years Come September" introduces listeners to the recovering alcoholic whose daily struggles continue in waves of guilt and loss.  The ghosts of what might've been haunt him like the keening pedal steel that wanders throughout the song: I've been cursed with this clarity / I just stare in the mirror, yelling at a stranger looking back at me.  Those regrets also plague the dreams of the narrator behind "How Wicked I Was", despite his intention to protect those he loves.  The musical bed beneath these more introspective numbers is masterfully subtle and dramatic, a perfect compliment to Barham's glimpses behind the everyday curtain:  I knew that this day would come / When I'd have to pay for all the damage I've done ... The only monster in this house is me.

Despite their habitual lineup changes, American Aquarium have always been a tight band, capable of fueling a muscular blend of Southern country-rock 'n roll.  The guitar line from "Luckier You Get" is as indelible as the song's singalong chorus and bright piano runs.  It's the sort of bar band jam that has emanated from sweaty stages for generations, a blue-collar rocker with a message as solid as its drumbeat: The harder you work, the luckier you get.  And Barham is capable of floating the perfect turn-of-phrase that has driven country music since its inception.  "Starts With You" boasts another fine guitar line, along with the brilliant verse:  Any day that ends in Y is a good day to wreck it / Rip it all to pieces just to start brand new / But then I met you and changed my way of thinking / Now I don't want a day that doesn't start with you.

It's no secret that our kind of music can attract its fair share of fans with a conservative bent.  It's just the lay of the land, and bands of a more progressive mindset have always had to face the fact.  Barham has acknowledged this in interviews, as well as in his music, saying that he arrives with a definite political and social perspective with which he doesn't expect some of his listeners will agree.  That said, he is also personally committed to encouraging dialogue and entering into those encounters with empathy, a stance which I admire.  He writes: Neither the Left or the Right / Are gonna fight for the folks stuck in between.  You'll encounter this juxtaposition on "Better South", one of the LP's more firmly country cuts.  They say sing your songs boy, and shut your mouth / But I believe in a better South.

BJ Barham fully owns up to who he is, as a man of the South who hails from a long line of the same.  And while he refuses to hide his personal leanings, so many of his songs are delivered by characters who might have some disagreement with him.  It takes skill to be comfortable in that balance, and Barham does it as well as any of  our current songwriters.  On the album's closer, "Long Haul", he gives voice to detractors:  They say 'You ain't been the same / Since you lay that bottle down / The songs they ain't got no soul / The band's done lost its sound / Get your head out of the clouds boy / Pretty soon you'll realize / That sometimes the kindest thing you can do / For a dream is let it die'.  To his credit, the writer is in it for the long haul, facing down his challenges and evolving as an artist of admirable ability and expression.  Alongside Shooter Jennings and his current bandmates, Lamentations stands as his boldest, largest palette to date, ranging from cinematic to intimate, from good humored to confrontational.  He demonstrates the sort of integrity that made some of his musical forebears exemplary artists.


- Sarah Shook & the Devil, "Ghost Town" Seven  (Shook, 13)
- X, "Free" Alphabetland  (Fat Possum, 20)
- Sylvia Rose Novak, "Little Sister" Bad Luck  (Novak, May 8)
- Roadside Graves, "Sit So Close" That's Why We're Running Away  (Don Giovanni, May 22)  D
- Lydia Loveless, "Bilbao" Real  (Bloodshot, 16)
- Harmed Brothers, "All the Same" Across the Waves  (Fluff & Gravy, Jun 5)
- Lucinda Williams, "Big Rotator" Good Souls Better Angels  (Hwy 20, 20)
- Jake Xerxes Fussell, "Raggy Levy" Jake Xerxes Fussell  (Paradise of Bachelors, 15)
- Old 97s, "Designs On You" Satellite Rides  (Elektra, 01)
- Laura Marling, "Strange Girl" Song For Our Daughter  (Partisan, 20)
- Elijah Ocean, "I Left My One Spot (Back At the Five Spot)" Blue Jeans & Barstools  (Ocean, 20)
- Tessy Lou Williams, "Busy Counting Bridges" Tessy Lou Williams  (TLW, May 22)  D
- Halden Wofford, "Wolves of Colfax" Devil's Interval  (Wofford, 20)  D
- Damien Jurado, "End of the Road" What's New Tomboy  (Mama Bird, 20)
^ American Aquarium, "Better South" Lamentations  (New West, 20)
- Jess Williamson, "Smoke" Sorceress  (Mexican Summer, May 15)
- Andrew Bryant, "Something Else" Sentimental Noises  (Magnolia State, 20)
- Van Darien, "Ponderosa" Levee  (Van Darien, 20)
- Devil Doll, "Lover & a Fighter" Lover & a Fighter  (Devil Doll, 20)
- Pert Near Sandstone, "Castles In the Air" Rising Tide  (PNS, Jun 12)  D
- Dixie Chicks, "Julianna Calm Down" Gaslighter  (Columbia, 20)
- Otis Gibbs, "It Was a Train" Souvenirs of a Misspent Youth  (Wannamaker, 14)
- Bowerbirds, "Endless Chase" single  (Psychic Hotline, 20)  D
- Rose City Band, "Real Long Gone" Summerlong  (Thrill Jockey, May 15)
- Shannon LaBrie, "Firewalker" single  (Moraine, 20)  D
- Brian Wright & the Sneakups, "What You Don't Know" Lapse of Luxury  (Cafe Rooster, May 8)
- Pete Bernhard, "Land of Milk & Honey" Harmony Ascension Division  (Kahn, 20)  D
- Lori McKenna, "When You're My Age" The Balladeer  (CN, Jul 24)  D
- Jaime Wyatt, "By Your Side" Neon Cross  (New West, May 29)
- Shooter Jennings, "Deed and the Dollar" Family Man  (Black Country Rock, 12)


New this week to our Routes & Branches Guide To Feeding Your Monster:  Eclectic Austin band White Denim have chosen this Friday to share World As a Waiting Room (Radio Milk).  Pert Near Sandstone is planning their first studio record in almost five years.  You can expect Rising Tide to crest on June 12.  Lori McKenna is wasting no time on her follow-up to 2018's The Tree.   Appropriately entitled The Balladeer, it should see the light of day on July 24.  Almost Home by Blind Boys of Alabama has been available via Amazon streaming services for several months.  You can expect a wider release via the always admirable Single Lock Records label on August 28.  Finally, the last project Hal Wilner was working on at the time of his recent passing, Angelheaded Hipster pays tribute to the music of Marc Bolan and TRex.  The record's wide-ranging list of contributors includes artists from Lucinda Williams and Father John Misty to Maria McKee and Victoria Williams.  You'll find that on shelves on September 4 courtesy of BMG.  And here's your weekly ROUTES-cast:

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