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HARLAN T. BOBO

  • 01. Human
    02. Spiders
    03. Nadine
    04. Sirens
    05. Ghost
    06. Storied
    07. Town
    08. Paula
    09. Wife
    cover

    HARLAN T. BOBO

    A History of Violence

    [engl] Once the intro to opener “Human” gives way to its fully-realized sonic purpose, it’s obvious that Harlan T. Bobo’s fourth proper album, A History of Violence, is quite different from his previous body of work. The classic historical emotional heft of a songwriter trying to make sense of life’s chaos, think mid-70s Lou Reed, especially Coney Island Baby, is a thread that can be heard running through the album’s mid-tempo tracks like “Human” and the miniature literary tragedy that is “Nadine”. The punchier tracks on the album, like “Spiders”, might conjure very early Green On Red, what X’s mid-80s output could have been, or even the roots-rock tendencies of overlooked genius, Cass McCombs. A History of Violence still highlights Bobo’s whiskey-and-cigarette-informed vocal style, and on the more intimate tracks, it’s a distorted ear candy that warbles into increasingly sunken, uncomfortable places, like that of the songwriter with which comparisons have followed Bobo throughout his career: the late Leonard Cohen. But there is a richer canvas on which to work this time out, not to mention a decidedly heavier and darker one. The album was recorded in Memphis with Doug Easley, who has previously worked with Cat Power, Pavement, Wilco, Sonic Youth, Jon Spencer, and Jeff Buckley. Bobo also brought in Steve Selvidge (The Hold Steady, Bash & Pop) on bass and Jeff “Bunny” Dutton (Action Family) on guitar, along with regular contributors Jeff Bouck (Polyphonic Spree) and Brendan Spangler (Viva l’American Death Ray). The result is a naturally dynamic album that seems equally at home with howling guitars and heavy bass lines as it does with haunting piano and humble pleas. A History of Violence is Bobo’s most complex -- and complete -- album to date.
    Format
    LP
    Release-Datum
    22.06.2018
     
  • 01. Worry
    02. Anymore Than Me
    03. Rachel’s Arms
    04. Satisfaction
    05. Prey
    06. Desert
    07. Fan
    08. Rock Star
    09. Tom
    10. Another Heavy
    11. Must Be In Memphis
    12. Let Momma Sleep
    13. Free
    cover

    HARLAN T. BOBO

    Porch Songs

    [engl] Too enigmatic, too laconic, and too careless about the music biz to gain fame outside of his adopted homes in Tennessee and France, Harlan T Bobo is a rare bird – a soulful, comedic, yet vicious and wholly underrated singer-songwriter, a divorced single father who seems happiest when he’s most dissolute. Porch Songs, the long-awaited next chapter in Bobo’s discography, will be released on Goner Records on August 5, 2022. Everything, and nothing, has changed: Bobo’s painfully sharp lyrics and graveled delivery are omnipresent. He still deals in unvarnished, uncomfortable truths about love. His wearied worldview, revered by his listeners, has further ossified on Porch Songs, which abounds with sad titles, worn out lyrics, and tunes about departed friends, such as “Fan,” which unravels Bobo’s memories of the late Shawn Cripps. Despite the sparse melancholy that clouds most of the album’s 13 tracks, Porch Songs is no downer. Instead, it bristles with energy, sounding like a beyond-the-grave gift bestowed on Bobo from the ghosts of Waylon Jennings, Lou Reed, and Leonard Cohen. Bobo laughs when offered the comparison. “They may be mildly derivative of those people, but they’re not that good.” Listeners will disagree. Take “Worry,” the opening song: it unwinds like Jennings’ early outlaw country tune “The Taker,” with a similar wry sentimentality that underwrites the folly of failed love. Bobo’s commiseration on the song sounds close-up and confidential, as if he’s telling his story to the stranger on the next barstool. “Satisfaction,” “Prey,” and “Fan,” on the other hand, evoke the celestial melodies that comprise Cohen’s Songs of Love and Hate–with every lyric, it seems, Bobo addresses his muse from the point-of-view of a rearview mirror. Unlike Reed, Bobo will never have his “Perfect Day.” As he croons on the final verse of “Satisfaction,” “what a shame.” “I recorded these songs just to get them out of my head,” says Bobo. He cut 11 of the tracks that ultimately wound up on Porch Songs in a single day onto eight-track tape at Watt House, a rehearsal space in Perpignan, France. Perpignan has been home for more than a decade now, after rambling from Ohio to San Francisco to Memphis, with myriad layovers in between. And while they may have, as Bobo claims, “languished under his bed for years” – these 13 songs rank among the best he’s written. It’s also worth taking a cinematic approach to Porch Songs. Not counting Bobo’s holiday album, Merry Christmas Spaceman, Porch Songs is his fifth full-length record, following Too Much Love, I’m Your Man, Sucker, and A History of Violence. Taken as an entirety, the album sequence is similar to François Truffaut’s semi-autobiographical Antoine Doinel Cycle, which began with The 400 Blows and ended with Love on the Run. On Porch Songs, Bobo may be, like Doinel, bloodied and bowed, but, as he sings on “Desert,” he has finally “made a home in the desert sun.” Then the raucous “Rock Star” turns back to Jennings’ outlaw story-song style, as does “Tom” and the singalong “Must Be in Memphis,” which portrays the nightlife Bobo left behind in the Bluff City. “I’m feeling my best and acting my worst/I must be in Memphis tonight,” he sings, describing decadent pool parties, late night gay bars, and the general detritis of a musician’s life. For “Let Mama Sleep,” Bobo downshifts into a merciless lullaby, then closes with a full band (guitarist Valentin Estel, drummer Sébastian Girard, and bassist Phil Argeles) on “Free,” a sunnier song that harkens back to the lovesick emotions that pervaded Too Much Love and I’m Your Man. “There are silly songs on the album,” Bobo acknowledges, “but the heaviest hitters are about the dissolution of a relationship. None of the music I’m listening to myself is this confessional. Artists I like can keep my interest going without talking about their own lives, but I can’t seem to do that. Whenever I sit down by myself, with a guitar, I’m consoling myself. I write to console myself. When I’m happy, I’ve got better things to do.”
    Format
    LP
    Release-Datum
    31.03.2023