“They say a bird in the hand is worth somethin’, but I forget what,” Eric D. Johnson sings on “The Saddest Part of the Song,” the sweeping opening track on his 12th album recording as Fruit Bats, The Landfill. One song later, he is questioning again: “Time heals all wounds is a thing they say, but I haven’t always found it to be that way.”
On this 10-track collection, Johnson is as adept at deconstructing melodies as he is platitudes. Inspired by the junk-filled holes in his native Midwest that eventually become mountains, The Landfill explores the unglamorous bits that make up the human story, and how everything that matters to us is born of something (or someone) else.
Produced by Johnson with additional production and mixing from longtime collaborator Thom Monahan, The Landfill trades the more intimate introspection of his previous work, Baby Man, for the dynamism of the Fruit Bats live band, recording with minimal overdubs and zero click tracks at Washington’s Bear Creek Studios. That’s how his trio, Bonny Light Horseman, usually approaches their projects — and here, that looseness brings some of the most sonically rich work Fruit Bats have captured in the studio yet.
As a project, Fruit Bats have always felt comfortable with being sincere, and on The Landfill, it’s never at the expense of lightness. The playful funkiness of “Think Aboutcha” and the rolling drums of “Perhaps We’re a Storm” keep balance with the tenderness of songs like “Silverfish in the Sink.” Johnson can master both impressionist lyricism with vivid specificity, and match the range of his vocals to boot: “There’s music coming from the place next door,” he sings on “Silverfish,” “It’s that kid who tape-records the radio/Hear him curse the Lord and pace the floor/He hates his dad, who hates him back.” Things can turn from personal to external just one line away, as Johnson looks at how things end, how they begin, and everything that happens in between.
He ends the album on the title track, with the band full-speed ahead, speaking from a birds-eye view like a rock & roll Shakespearian chorus, surveying everything below: “This is the end of the movie,” he sings, a bit of weathered growl creeping in. Johnson knows everything looks different when you see it not for what it was, but what it could be.
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