JD Clayton put out his 2018 debut EP, Smoke Out the Fire, and was prepared to set the world on fire with what was to come next. Turns out a once in a lifetime pandemic completely shutting down the world – including all forms of touring – was next. So, Clayton put his dreams on hold and started working at a landscaping company. But even working at this new job he was still writing songs.
“I would be in the back of the truck driving with the crew from job to job. I would throw in my headphones and try to write a song, or I would listen to old albums from top to bottom,” he said recently. “I constantly listened to The Band, Lynyrd Skynyrd, and Creedence Clearwater Revival. I was so enamored by the production choices and musicality of those records. I really think I began to develop an ear for that sound.”
The result is Long Way From Home, his debut LP, and a wildly satisfying, pretention free collection of Americana and Country tracks. The album opens on the sweet, but mellow “Hello, Good Mornin’” but it’s not until the second track, “American Millionaire,” that you get the real feel for what follows for the next 40 minutes. The track here are lyrically smart but it’s Clayton’s leisure delivery, not unlike Willie Nelson, that really sells these songs.
What follows are dips into Country Swing (“Beauty Queen”), Honky Tony (“Gold Mine”) and even moments of Southern Rock (“Heartaches After Heartbreak”). Clayton gives a fantastic, goosebump-inducing take on the classic folk song “Midnight Special” that even John Fogerty would have to applaud. The album closes on “Sleepy Night In Nashville,” a sometime spoken/sung lullaby that that just goes to expand the musical touchstones on this record even further.
Given his penchant for listening to them while working his day job you can hear the influences of CCR and The Band throughout the record, but there are also echoes of everyone from Guy Clark to John Prine, especially in the lyrics. It may have happened a few years longer than he originally planned, but with Long Way From Home, Clayton has finally put out a record many peers will try their entire careers to accomplish.
