Reviews sometimes involve a degree of synchronicity. In this case, my first listen to Andrew Adkins\u2019 new album Glass Castles<\/i> closely followed my reading the section of Peter Ames Carlin\u2019s new Springsteen biography Bruce<\/i> in which he describes events leading up to and surrounding the recording of Springsteen\u2019s 1973 debut Greetings From Asbury Park, New Jersey<\/i>. Springsteen had been a flashy guitar hero \/ bandleader on the Jersey shore for several years before Columbia A&R man John Hammond abruptly signed him as a solo artist. Having auditioned with just himself and an acoustic guitar, he proceeded to battle the expectations of his label\u2014that he would be the \u201cnew Dylan,\u201d an acoustic troubadour with a dense, highly literate lyrical style\u2014through the entire recording process, adding instruments and bandmates day by day without ever breaking through the skewed vision Columbia initially held of who he was as an artist.<\/p>\n
Producing his own disc on a small indie label, Nashville singer-songwriter-multi-instrumentalist Adkins obviously faced no such pressure, and seems entirely comfortable in the musical skin he inhabits on Glass Castles<\/i>\u2014a skin that bears a distinct resemblance to Greetings<\/i>-era Springsteen and\/or pre-Newport, acoustic Dylan. You hear it from the opening bars of \u201cFreeborn Heart\u201d\u2014the acoustic guitar, piano and harmonica folk arrangement with banjo and steel guitar offering country accents, backing a skilled wordsmith with a rough-hewn voice whose deep conviction brings results: the voice might not qualify as \u201cpretty,\u201d but this keening plea of a song surely does. (\u201cI never said that I was lonely \/ But I\u2019m lonely and I\u2019m desperately in need of a dear friend.\u201d) <\/p>\n
The Dylan point of reference is cemented by the arrival of the even prettier \u201cMay The Stars Fall At Your Door,\u201d whose lyric offers a lengthy list of good wishes for its object (\u201cMay your prayers all be answered \/ May the best of everything your way come\u201d) that keeps feeling like it wants to end a couplet with \u201cMay you stay forever young.\u201d Thankfully, it doesn\u2019t, but this sweet original surely counts as homage. \u201cLike A Stone\u201d (no \u201cRolling\u201d) has a similarly Dylanesque cast to the lyric, informing the noncommittal \u201clady of mine\u201d he\u2019s wooing that \u201cMy heart\u2019s like a stone when thrown \/ It just sinks to the bottom.\u201d<\/p>\n
As the album progresses the arrangements pick up fresh flavors and shading, with \u201cThe River In All Of Us\u201d adding drums and \u201cFlicker Out And Fade\u201d adding oomph to the electric guitars. The Dylanisms resurface when \u201cThe Ballad Of Wayne WV\u201d opens with a wheezy Hammond organ fresh from Highway 61 Revisited<\/i>, though Adkins layers a classic soul horn chart on top of it. <\/p>\n
Adkins\u2019 voice has an edge of rasp that makes every tune here feel a little world-weary, whether the song itself is wistful\u2014as on the boastfully-yet-accurately named \u201cThe Song That Made The World Cry\u201d\u2014or matter-of-fact, as on the sharply-realized title cut (whose principal melody feels like it might borrow something from Paul Simon\u2019s \u201cFifty Ways To Leave Your Lover\u201d).<\/p>\n
Highlights toward the tail end include the early-rock, \u201cnight on the town\u201d bounce of \u201cOld Coal Town\u201d; when the electric guitar and horns kick in on the chorus, it\u2019s an instant party. By contrast, \u201cAs Above As So Below\u201d is a dark, heavy number that opens acoustic and apocalyptic (\u201cSome pray for peace, some just pray for rain\u201d) before zooming in further (\u201cI\u2019ve got skin like armor, I don\u2019t feel anything \/ I\u2019ve got a heart that\u2019s fractured deep within my chest\u201d). With a rippling tension running through every line, the song builds steadily, adding percussion, bass and electric guitar verse by verse. Closer \u201cJubilee\u201d turns in a different direction, going full-on country-blues with fiddle, dobro, a gospel chorus, and a vibe that manages to feel both celebratory and valedictory, a hoedown at a funeral. <\/p>\n
While Andrew Adkins offers respectful nods to this album\u2019s clear antecedents, Glass Castles<\/i> emerges as an original piece of work, an album of rich, vibrant country-folk featuring heartfelt lyrics and sharp, creative arrangements that dip into every corner of the Great American Songbook. There\u2019s no telling, of course, but if you ask me, Bruce would surely dig it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":32642,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[9782],"rating":[5617],"class_list":["post-44410","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-andrew-adkins","rating-rating-b-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/44410","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44410"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/44410\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32642"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44410"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=44410"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=44410"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}