Recorded in an 18th-century farmhouse in Maine, these songs from singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Kris Delmhorst (KD) about the ghosts of the past and present seem to fit the setting. She paints the kind of detailed character sketches that may haunt your dreams, too. She writes with exceptional detail yet stays pretty even-keeled emotionally. The emotions are ours to soak in; her words alone will make us do so. The album was tracked live with a core band of drummer Ray Rizzo, bassist Jeremy Moses Curtis, and guitarist Erik Koskinen. Engineer Sam Kassirer added keys, and Rich Hinman stroked the pedal steel. Delmhorst’s guest vocalists list reads like a who’s who of Americana with Anais Mitchell, Rose Cousins, Ana Tivel, Ana Egge, Jeffrey Foucault, and others who serve as carefully selected single contributors by track, some more than once.
The hazy, dreamy “Summer’s Growing Old” opens as Delmhorst and Koskinen weave their electric guitars, creating a haunting sound enhanced by Cousins’ vocals. The same core crew with Delmhorst on acoustic and Kassirer on organ render the ominous hypnotic “Wolves,” which Delmhorst sings in barely a whisper, the only track where she is alone at the mic. She ponders the mortality of parents and how we deal with it, how we summon the courage to face the inevitable, knowing our time will come too – “I see wolves /circling the fire/circling the fire with their yellow eyes….look em in the eye like some kinda friend/do you really love the story if you don’t love the end.”
That last line may hold the crux of the album theme and certainly paves the way for the title track. KD is on Rhodes, assisted by Jabe Beyer on vocals, while Hinman’s pedal steel intertwines with Kassirer’s organ to create a haunting soundscape. Delmhorst doesn’t flinch. She invites the ghosts into the conversation in the garden, in the car, in the dishes, at the bar, in the records, and everywhere else, knowing that we can learn from them. In another forboding tune, joined by Foucault, she sings of finding a ghost town in the mountains, an indictment of human ravaging of nature as much as anything else. The delicate, lilting “Age of Innocence” with Ana Egge and light instrumentation is delivered from the viewpoint of a future ghost, taking the theme of Joni Mitchell’s “Big Yellow Taxi” to an even deeper level.
“Won’t Be Long” feels a bit less personal, more of a collective rant about our blind impulse for self-destructive greed, born of the societal crash during the pandemic. Unlike the others, though, it’s a jangly, angst-driven rocker with electric guitars blending with pedal steel as Rachel Baiman helps Delmhorst wail on the choruses. On Rhodes and with Ana Tivel’s assistance, KD depicts a most lonely character in the tender “Not the Only One,” ultimately giving empathy, letting her know that she’s not alone. “Lucky River” is about a lonely fisherman, full of lines about yearning as Mitchell’s harmonies color verses such as “cars roll by on 53/places to go they don’t see me/blew a little more cold rain today/I thought I wanted april but I guess I wanted May…” “Beyond the Boundaries” has a soldier recalling a one memorable night with a lover lost to boundaries of space and time, and ultimately fate. Delmhorst’s way of communicating, as she does in several places, is that we are not always in control of our destinies. It’s the richest tune musically as multiple guitars, keyboards, and Hinman’s pedal steel converge at a weeping pace underneath Delmhorst and Taylor Ashton’s lovely voices.
Emerging from these dreamy soundscapes is the thumping rocker “Dematerialize,” as KD again teams with Beyer as if abstractly it might be better to be a ghost after all – “I sent a signal into the black (I fly away, I dematerialize”) Closer “Something to Show,” again with Cousins, is about those restless nights we all share on occasion, especially looking for those glimmers of hope to mitigate the grief.
These are primarily tender and provocative songs, some more abstract than others, while others are highly relatable. In her own insightful and caressing way, Delmhorst has effectively addressed the seven stages of grief.
