For over twenty years, Nashville's Lambchop has been one of the most infamous and innovative bands in the now well established alt-country scene. While the band has never received popularity of many of their glossier contemporaries, Lambchop has been revered for the high energy music, cynical lyrics, and brutal honesty. For their latest album, Mr. M, Lambchop slows it down to pay homage to a friend and mentor.
Mr. M is dedicated to Vic Chestnutt, a southern singer and songwriter close to the band for throughout their career, who passed away suddenly in 2009 (Widespread Panic fans should know this man well). The band, never opposed to morphing their sound, created an album that gave the man the peaceful, pretty send off he would like. Lambchop refined their sound, making Mr. M the seemless intersection of lounge and dive bar. Frontman Kurt Wagoner still has his drunken elocution (he says 'fuck' in the first line of the album), but is wistful instead of rocking. Exchanging their high energy honky-tonk for delicate strings and textures, the band is taking its time; life reflection has certainly affected Lambshop's sense of urgency. Slow keyboard based ballads once again show that Lambchop always operates by their own definition of the word genre.
Wagoner and Lambchop clearly have not come to terms with their dear friends death, as Mr. M fluctuates emotions throughout the album: sarcasm quickly deepens into guilt, and back up into joyful nostalgia. The ghost of Vic Chestnutt will be haunting the members of this band for a long time to come, but Mr. M is the perfect catharsis, and a beautiful elegy by one of his best proteges.
Mr. M is dedicated to Vic Chestnutt, a southern singer and songwriter close to the band for throughout their career, who passed away suddenly in 2009 (Widespread Panic fans should know this man well). The band, never opposed to morphing their sound, created an album that gave the man the peaceful, pretty send off he would like. Lambchop refined their sound, making Mr. M the seemless intersection of lounge and dive bar. Frontman Kurt Wagoner still has his drunken elocution (he says 'fuck' in the first line of the album), but is wistful instead of rocking. Exchanging their high energy honky-tonk for delicate strings and textures, the band is taking its time; life reflection has certainly affected Lambshop's sense of urgency. Slow keyboard based ballads once again show that Lambchop always operates by their own definition of the word genre.
Wagoner and Lambchop clearly have not come to terms with their dear friends death, as Mr. M fluctuates emotions throughout the album: sarcasm quickly deepens into guilt, and back up into joyful nostalgia. The ghost of Vic Chestnutt will be haunting the members of this band for a long time to come, but Mr. M is the perfect catharsis, and a beautiful elegy by one of his best proteges.
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