Richmond Fontaine – 13 Cities

Sonic JuiceDick Laurent wäre damit schon mal draußen, andere werden vermutlich aus Gewohnheit zugreifen.

So do I. Wobei ich finde, dass die Band nicht immer nur die klassische No Depression-Ästhetik bedient, sondern auch andere Schubladen öffnet. So habe ich mir vor einiger Zeit die 1999-er Veröffentlichung „Lost son“ zugelegt, die z.B. auch immer wieder Richtung Country-Punk driftet. Allerdings bin ich jetzt erstaunt, dass es schon 8 Alben sind.

Sonic JuiceWer also von „Garden Ruin“ entsetzt war und immer noch seligen „Black Light“-Zeiten hinterhertrauert (zu der Gruppe gehöre ich je nach Tageslaune auch manches Mal), dürfte hier eine passable Alternative alter Americana-Schule vorfinden, der allemal zum Mitwippen und Sofalümmeln einlädt.

Ich gehöre der Fraktion an, die von „Garden ruin“ überrascht, aber nicht entsetzt war. Ich fand den Schritt, den Burns/Convertino getan haben, durchaus gut, ohne dass ich damit die alten Alben diskreditieren will.

Wenn Du, Sonic, mit diesem Album bei Richmond Fontaine eingestiegen bist, möchte ich Dir wärmstens das 2004-er Album „Post to wire“ ans Herz legen, mit dem ich die Band entdeckt habe. Ein wunderbares Kleinod, bei dem es sehr vieles zu entdecken gilt.

Wo kann man das Album denn hören?

Sonic Juice

Produzent JD Foster kann man etwa von Green On Red, Richard Buckner oder Calexico kennen

Kennen schon aber nicht schätzen. Leider hat er auch die neue Danny & Dusty produziert.

Die ersten englischen Reviews sind online:

Americana UK – „Thirteen Cities“ 10/10

Astonishing.

Richmond Fontaine need little introduction to fans of the Americana genre and this, their seventh offering, will not disappoint afficianados. They will have come to most people’s attention following 2004s „Post To Wire“ and will have continued to find a place in many people’s hearts with 2005s „The Fitzgerald“ a sparser, more low key affair. This time around the personnel (both band and producer) remain the same and its good to see that the travelogue format still has some mileage. The music however is built from an entirely different sonic palette. The result is nothing short of breathtaking. There are fourteen tracks on offer here each different but each (aside from the three instrumentals) held together by the vocal stylings and literate lyrical musings of front man Willy Vlautin. It is no surprise that Vlautin has made the move from musician to literary exponent, having his first novel „The Motel Life“ published last year. If this album were a book it would be best described as a ‚page-turner‘, it has an uncanny ability to hold the listener rapt, wondering what on earth will come next, never once during its forty three minutes plus running time becoming anything less than absorbing and compelling, each song a new chapter driving a narrative that, dealing as it does with Vlautin’s obsession with the seedy underbelly of mid-western life, becomes a vivid dissection of guilt, loss, change, unhappiness, loneliness and restless drifting. That’s not to say that this is an homogenous collection of tunes. Instead what you get is a grouping of songs that reflect the characters which are being depicted. Hence each is different, each has its own pool of instruments upon which to draw a different soundscape and it is the sequencing of these that is the real triumph of the record.

We begin with „Intro/The Border“ as short instrumental foreword which prepares the palette for what is to come. Following swiftly on we have „“Moving Back Home #2“ all shuffling drums and mariachi horns. We move then to „$87 And A Guilty Conscience That Gets Worse The Longer I Go“ a sublime altcountry classic right there and then – midtempo, drizzling of pedal steel, lyrics about a guilty drifter finding penitence. Next up is „Fell Into Painting Houses in Phoenix“, voice and frantically strummed acoustic guitar with a harmonica solo floating over the top, lyric about disgust and loathing. Track five is a haunting, slow burning instrumental which begins with guitar, violin and pedal steel and metamorphoses into a full band effort repleat with organ, bits of feedback and a beautiful melody line – „El Tiradito“ is apparently a shrine to musicians and poets in Tucson. Further metamorphosis occurs at the end of this track as we glide gently into „A Ghost I Became“, brushed drums, double bass as a percussion instrument, bits of guitar and organ making for ghostly background effects – proof positive that this album is a work of an altogether different stripe. To elaborate more would be to spoil the effect for the listener, rather akin to revealing the end of a story. Suffice to say that if you can find a place for further songs that feature by turns pop-like hooks, spoken word, noisescapes and lyrics of an enthralling, cathartic nature (sample: „But I fucked up again/ I barely know who I am/ I’m sorry for all the things I haven’t done/I’m just lost in this world“) then this album will delight, beguile and entrance you. All this and there’s scarcely room to mention that Joey Burns, Howe Gelb and Paul Brainard drop by to participate.

We live in a world of hyperbole and exaggeration which is a pity because when this album is called a masterpiece such words lose some of their effect. But a masterpiece it is – daring, adventurous, literate, and consummate.

UNCUT – „Thirteen Cities“ ****
Willy Vlautin has not been idle since the 2005 release of his sparse masterpiece, The Fitzgerald. There was an album of re-recorded work, showing Richmond Fontaine’s Portland roots in hardcore; an internet-only live set; and a novel, The Motel Life, which read like a prose version of one of his songs, following two losers round Reno as they waited for their luck to change.

As the laureate of the lost, the lonely, and the rootless, Vlautin was never likely to stand still, and while there is no dramatic change in the texture of his lyrics, the geography has altered. Vlautin’s drifters are still skirting the borders of oblivion, but their tales unfold against a desert backdrop. On „Ghost I Became“, he sends this stark postcard: „Desert dreams/Always sunny/And never grey/No noise/Just wind and sage.“

The words are spare, but the sound has expanded. Recording in Tucson, Arizona, producer JD Foster drafted Giant Sand’s Howe Gelb (piano on „$87 And A Guilty Conscience That Gets Worse The Longer I Go“) and Calexico’s Joey Burns and Jacob Valenzuela. The widescreen sound, with the melancholy mists of Paul Brainard’s pedal steel cooling Calexico’s Mexican spaghetti stylings, is a surprise after The Fitzgerald. Sometimes it masks the blunt beauty of Vlautin’s storytelling, but it can also add a noirish sheen: Valenzuela’s gorgeous trumpet on „The Kid From Belmont Street“ turns a maudlin song into a shimmering pulp opera.

Vlautin has been inspired by his surroundings, and there are at least two classics. The closer, „Lost In This World“ (with Burns on piano) is worthy of early Tom Waits, though Vlautin’s voice displays vulnerability where Waits offers beat-up defiance. „St Ides, Parked Cars, And Other People’s Homes“ is little more than a short poem, and Vlautin almost talks the words. But when he gets to the part about „fuck-ups, hanging on in our own way“, you know, as ever, he’s not faking.

Mojo – „Thirteen Cities“ ****

Oregon-Coast Country Band Explore the Great American Tradition of Drifting

Richmond Fontaine’s Willy Vlautin has the rigour of mind and soul it takes to write lyrics about conscience-honoured or betrayed. In plain-man’s language, he portrays dislocated people running into the real nature of their lives. While he touches on issues such as racism and economic exploitation, his key characters are the wanderers of „Capsized“ and „Lost in This World“. Inconsolably regretting damage they’ve done, they presage the existential shift of „A Ghost I Became“ where the narrator is left „heading further and further out'“ into a New Mexican/metaphysical desert. Inspired by a move to Tucson after years in Portland, Richmond Fontaine have stepped out of what this reviewer thought a dull alt-country groove to musically match the depths of their songwriting with tough-sweet arrangements ranging from lone acoustic guitar to Tex-Mex brass and accordions. Heart of America calling out Around the world.

Das liest sich doch alles sehr schön. Ich denke doch, dass ich mich am kommenden Wochenende nach dem Album umtun muss, allerdings nicht ohne vorher eine gehörige Hörprobe zu nehmen.