Swift’s fourth solo album, The Legend of Roy Black, was released earlier this month and proves once again why he is held in such high regard on the East Coast music scene and beyond. From his easy-going, story-telling songwriting, to his choice of co-writes and covers, to the musicians and production team he’s worked with, everything fits where it should on this album. The songs invite you into the stories of these lives and the instrumentals give you the time to reflect. With weepy pedal steel here and there, banjo and mandolin leads and breaks fill just enough space between the words, and strings set the mood and punctuate the stories. There is something familiar here, some classic kind of Tom Waits, Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan vibe, that makes you feel like you know where this is going, but then it doesn’t necessarily take the route you may have expected. The little twists and turns don’t take you any longer to get there, they just show you a few new views along the way.
The Legend of Roy Black was produced and recorded by Swift and Charles Austin at Echo Chamber Studio in Halifax, NS and mixed and mastered by Dave Gunning at Wee House of Music in Pictou, NS. It features Swift on acoustic and resonator guitars and vocals, Tom Easley on stand up bass, Asa Brosius on pedal steel, and J.P. Cormier on mandolin, violins and banjo. Gunning also performs high-strung guitar on one number. These top-notch, talented musicians work very well together. Nobody is looking for attention here and there is plenty of room for everything to breathe, as the playing, production, instrumentation and arrangements serve the music, first and foremost, to present it in its most flattering light.
Join Thom Swift tonight, Thursday, June 23 at Kiju’s Restaurant at the Membertou Trade & Convention Centre, for an intimate show celebrating the release of this great new record.
