Artist: Josh Ritter
Album: Gathering
Bitrate: 213kbps avg
Quality: EAC Secure Mode / LAME 3.98.4 / -V0 / 44.100Khz
Label: Pytheas Recordings
Genre: Rock
Size: 153.05 megs
PlayTime: 1h 34min 35sec total
Rip Date: 2017-09-30
Store Date: 2017-09-22
Track List: Disc #1/2
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01. Shaker Love Song (Leah) 1:03
02. Showboat 4:22
03. Friendamine 2:53
04. Feels Like Lightning 3:02
05. When Will I be Changed? 5:52
(featuring Bob Weir)
06. Train Go By 4:26
07. Dreams 6:20
08. Myrna Loy 7:30
09. Interlude 1:24
10. Cry Softly 2:45
11. Oh Lord (Part 3) 3:31
12. Thunderbolt's Goodnight 4:05
13. Strangers 3:28
Track List: Disc #2/2
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01. Shaker Love Song (Leah) [Home 1:07
Recordings]
02. Showboat [Home Recordings] 3:04
03. Friendamine [Home Recordings] 2:23
04. Feels Like Lightning [Home 3:52
Recordings]
05. When Will I Be Changed 4:36
(featuring Bob Weir) [Home
Recordings]
06. Train Go By [Home Recordings] 3:32
07. Dreams [Home Recordings] 5:28
08. Myrna Loy [Home Recordings] 6:02
09. Interlude [Home Recordings] 1:18
10. Cry Softly [Home Recordings] 2:30
11. Oh Lord (Part 3) [Home 3:27
Recordings]
12. Thunderbolt's Goodnight [Home 3:19
Recordings]
13. Strangers [Home Recordings] 3:16
Release Notes:
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Every Josh Ritter album has been rooted in American folk traditions, but none
have stitched together quite as many musical threads as Gathering. The album
includes shaker hymns and campfire songs, spirituals and railroad rambles,
country-western tunes and delicate waltzes, all combined into a deep and
colorful tapestry backed by the Royal City Band. But while Gathering is rooted
in the past, it never sounds staid. Ritter is mindful of folk forms but never
beholden to them, using traditional structures as jumping-off points for some of
his richest writing and scruffiest performances to date.
The latter is most obvious in the album's back half, including ôCry Softly,ö
which opens with a squall of feedback before setting off on a folk-rock ramble,
and ôOh Lord, Pt. 3,ö which moves at a warped country gallop accompanied by a
full-on gospel chorus. Ritter hasn't sounded this lively or jocular since 2007's
The Historical Conquests of Josh Ritter, though there's a key tonal difference
between the two albums. The former set basked in the glow of new love, while
Gathering, just four years removed from Ritter's heavy-hearted divorce album The
Beast in Its Tracks, possesses an undercurrent of loss beneath its seemingly
more upbeat mood. These are songs of experience, weathered yet determined to be
optimistic.
ôShowboatö best captures Gathering's loose but chastened spirit. The song finds
Ritter riding a soulful groove, complete with congas and a horn section, telling
the story of a man set on maintain his stoic veneer, desperately praying for
rain just so he can shed a tear without anyone noticing. He's had his heart
broken but wants his former lover to think he's doing fine. Ritter's lyrics are
funny, but they also have biteùa sense of pain that's all too lived-in and real.
Throughout his latest album, Josh Ritter is mindful of folk forms but never
beholden to them.
If ôShowboatö suggests there's a wounded soul behind the album's swagger, ôCry
Softlyö makes it clear that this is also an album about moving on and letting
go. ôIt's good to see you back here, but I'm on to greener pastures/And if
you're gonna cry, cry softly,ö Ritter sings. Here Ritter seems less interested
in lament than he is in writing a righteous kiss-off.
Not everything is quite so uproarious; Ritter's rambling mode is always welcome,
but he also shines in the quiet moments. ôTrain Go Byö and ôFeels Like
Lightningö are both nimble acoustic ballads, suggesting night skies and
wide-open spaces. ôDreams,ö a half-spoken fever dream, full of surrealist
imagery and an exploratory, jazz-inflected backing, may be the most adventurous
song on Gathering, while the hopeful ôThunderbolt's Goodnightö offers a smart
variation on the old clichΘ about dawn coming after midnight: ôI thought the sun
was going down/ but the sun was coming up.ö
ôWhen Will I Be Changedö anchors the album's eclecticism and provides it with
its emotional center. The song, written and performed with the Grateful Dead's
Bob Weir, is a spiritual in the vein of Nick Lowe's ôThe Beast in Meöùa longing
for redemption, a plea for change. It's the album's most introspective moment,
the one where Ritter looks deeper than love and loss to the core of his own
tattered humanity, hoping to see it transformed. The track's church organ and
religious language root it in the gospel tradition, but once again, Ritter's not
interested in folk music for its own sake; tradition is the canvas on which he
displays his own vision, deeply personal and emotionally direct.
The same could be said of Gathering as a whole. It's as diverse as anything
Ritter's done yet also focused in its exploration of joy, sorrow, and their
strange intermingling. It's proof enough that Ritter is one of the true keepers
of the American folk lineageùa proud traditionalist and an utter original.