What does it sound like?:
Ian Noe’s first album released in 2019, Between the Country, was a fine debut, a piece of modern Appalachian folk consisting of strong tunes and bleak lyrics about America’s dispossessed. Kentucky born Noe has the kind of mournful voice ideally suited to songs about poverty and crystal meth addicts. His follow-up album, released recently, lightens the mood a little, but not by much. Aside from a couple of songs that rock out, it consists mainly of softly strummed acoustic guitar with splashes of pedal steel that bring the lyrics and Noe’s voice to centre stage. To some extent this is its undoing. By the third listen it becomes apparent that the melodies to tracks 4, 5, 6 and 11 are essentially the same, with the same musical phrase repeated endlessly throughout each song. When the last track, ‘Road May Flood’ kicks in there is a strange familiarity about it which soon becomes revealed when Noe slips into singing Bonnie Tyler’s ‘It’s a Heartache’, which is pretty much the same tune, albeit fully credited on the album sleeve. All this is very disconcerting; it’s as if Ian Noe has allowed the tunes to play second fiddle to the words – no bad thing if the tunes are good in the first place, but here they just aren’t quite strong enough.
What does it all *mean*?
Having said all of that, this isn’t a bad album – in fact it’s a pretty good one if you are prepared to overlook the similarities between the songs. One of the things that ultimately made Richmond Fontaine unlistenable for me was the unremitting bleakness of Willy Vlautin’s vision, which became so devoid of hope by the third or fourth album that his despairing lyrics almost became a parody of themselves. No doubt it’s a tough life in the Kentucky backroads. Ian Noe’s debut album showed that he clearly has songwriting talent; this new one hasn’t quite yet realised that early potential.
Goes well with…
Ian Noe’s first album Between the Country may be a better place to start.
Release Date:
25th March 2022
Might suit people who like…
Crying into their bourbon.
Boneshaker says
retropath2 says
I was offered a review copy of that album, listened and made my apologies……
Boneshaker says
It’s not great is it.
duco01 says
Thanks for the review, Boneshaker – and I broadly agree with you.
I thought Ian Noe’s “Between the Country” was superb, and the best track on it, “Letter to Madeline”, remains one of my favourite Americana songs of this century (beaten only by a couple of tracks from Jason Isbell’s “Southeastern”).
But … I dunno … “River Fools and Mountain Saints” falls a bit flat. As you say, the songs are rather samey. I’ll give it a few more listens, in the hope that something will jump out at me, but … yeah – I’d hoped for better.