Singer-songwriter, musician, and producer Ben Harper has taken the unplugged, unadorned route with his latest, Wide Open Light. The album is a follow-up to his 2022 Grammy nominated Bloodline Maintenance in which Harper coursed through hip-hop doo-wop, R&B, and blues. Wide Open Light, tough, is essentially a straight-forward singer-songwriter album, a folk album centered on personal songs, each related to the next, weighted toward pivotal moments and resilience. Harper produced the album together with his longtime collaborators Danny Kalb and Jason Mozersky, the latter of whom contributes guitar to two songs. Featured guests on the album include Jack Johnson, Shelby Lynne, and Piers Faccini.
The album is bookended by acoustically picked guitar instrumentals, the first “Heart and Crown” with a country blues feel that sets the quiet tone for what follows. Lap steel guitar imbues the live track “Giving Ghosts” as Harper struggles to cope with loss. Harper sings achingly with the guitar parts as stark as the title of the song. “Masterpiece” is a touchingly affectionate love song, sung with an intimate whisper with these lines in the final verse among the best of the imagery-filled verses – “And I’ll lean on you like a beggar/Leans upon the moonlit street/Loving you is my masterpiece.” Here you find Harper on guitar, lap steel, and piano. Shelby Lynne joins on the briskly strummed “8 Minutes” as Harper ruminates on a birthday without expected greetings from one of his children, and ponders mortality in the process, second-guessing career choices.
The album’s centerpiece is the released single “Yard Sale,” performed alongside Jack Johnson on slack key guitar and vocals. The clever lyrics describe a man in the final stages of a breakup, leaving the protagonist more confused with each verse. The opening lines inevitably draw attention – “She came to gather/All of her personal effects/ It seemed a bit too late/For goodbye sex” but the metaphor of comparing lost love to a yard sale is rather ingenious with this lead-in to the indelible chorus – “But all sales are final/No returns, not that you would/I’m pretty sure she’s gone for good.” Rather ironically, given the despair of the character, the music is upbeat, and you might find yourself singing the catchy chorus along with Harper and Johnson.
“Trying Not to Fall in Love with You” is another of these struggling relationship tunes, Harper alone at the piano, playing a series of dissonant chords throughout, and singing desperately, reaching into the high register. It’s a disturbing song and bears none of the singalong qualities of the former. It’s a bit reminiscent of Peter Case’s recently released piano-driven album. Harper accompanies himself with fingerpicked guitar on the title track, with harmonies from Piers Faccini, who also adds oud guitar, as Harper sings about being grateful for having a partner see him through tough times, aiming to walk together into “the wide open light.” “One More Change to Make” is the epitome of the pivotal moment songs. Backed by a choir (Travis Taylor, Keesha Gumbs, Karyn Porter) on the choruses as they did on the title track. Here, the protagonist is feeling ebullient about finally righting the ship – “one more chain to break, one more change to make.”
Another clever technique is turning a popular, rather predictable phrase such as “going, going, gone” into “She’s growing, she’s growing, she’s gone” as he reflects on a child reaching that point of leaving the parents and being independent. The final vocal song is “Love After Love,” which repeats another common theme of these songs – that one retreats to love as the ultimate refuge and source of renewal. Here, for the first time, we hear a backing band (Mosersky -guitar, Jesse Ingalis-bass, and Jimmy Paxson-drums). The ethereal instrumental “For Pat Brayer” sends us off and likely has the listener hitting repeat to further examine these personal songs, where at least a few will be relatable on some level. Even if that’s not the case, the crafty imagery, wordplay, and indelible choruses will likely linger.
