RCA VICTOR
2008
Gossip In The Grain
About This Album
Ray LaMontagne's third album, Gossip in the Grain is as different from 2007's Till the Sun Turns Black as that album was from 2006's Trouble. The deep, heart-of-night atmospherics of the preceding disc have been jettisoned in favor of a brightly lit palette of textures and instruments that legendary producer and multi-instrumentalist Ethan Johns uses to illustrate LaMontagne's considerable ambitions as a writer. The set opens with the singer channeling his inner Memphis soul man on "You Are the Best Thing." Horns, strings, and a female backing chorus underscore LaMontagne's heartfelt uptempo rasp that touches on Sam Cooke as much as it does Tim Buckley with a hook worthy of Stax/Volt. In terms of sequencing, it certainly grabs the listener, but it is also arguably the best track here. "Let It Be Me" follows with a folksier, looser soul groove, where acoustic guitars, a Telecaster, piano, and strings underscore the hypnotic lilt in the verse. But LaMontagne can write a coda and a bridge and he gets his voice right into the meat of the lyric. We may have heard lyrics of this type a thousand times before, as they evoke loneliness and longing, but rarely have they been expressed this authentically and this dramatically.
Track List (try tracks 1,2,3,4,5,6 and 7)

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.

 
report abuse