STURGILL SIMPSON
One of the unwritten rock rules regarding the introduction to the album is: start strongly and then just roll however you want it, but make sure to end it with a powerful ballade. One of the unwritten Southern rules is: start however you want, but end it passionately. Sturgil Simpson follows the second rule, not only due to his biography, but also because he has started his new album with a powerful ballade and closed it with a hardcore up-tempo rock n roll tune.
If you haven’t heard of Sturgil before, no worries. You will get to know him. Besides A Sailor’s Guide To Earth reaching top 10 on Billboard Album Chart, his song Sugar Daddy became a theme song for HBO’s Vinyl, a show creatively supported by Martin Scorsese and Mick Jagger. You will agree they know how to recognize artists.
For his third album, Simpson has found inspiration in his newborn son. As his son’s first days on Earth overlapped with Simpson’s promotional tour for the album Metamodern Sounds in Country Music, he didn’t have enough time to spend it with his son. Being apart from home, Surgill has felt like a sailor who is suffering from homesickness. This is a storyline for his new project. The feelings have surged into songs, and the band’s chemistry has done the rest.
Simpson is a student of traditional Southern school of country, soul and blues that teaches you not to rush when you are shaping a song. The flow is a master creator, you just got to let it show up.
The intro Welcome To Earth is silent at first and it describes the substantial change that came with the newborn son. Subsequently, it develops into a retro-crescendo. When a Southern guy says singing the heart out, he probably thinks about the Simpson’s voice. He is singing with his full voice, without melismas or exhibitions. Everything is in the service of the song. As a matter of fact, Simpson sounds just like Van Marrison or Tim Buckley.
Cover of Nirvana’s In Bloom was his wife’s idea. Simpson decided to improvise it in a soul manner, with glorious strings and chorus with wings. The best thing about it is that it actually functions pretty remarkably.
Oh Sarah is an old-fashioned love ballade written from the heart of a man who is not perfect. He just wants to leave every once in a while so that he can return. It sounds funny, but coming from Simpson’s mouth, it becomes a really serious matter. It becomes song written with blood. On the closing track Call To Arms, Simpson has a message for his son:
I hope you will not grow up thinking
You need to be a doll
In order to be a man
Strong. Powerful. Passionate. Just like rock record is suppose to sound.
