Wednesday, April 21, 2010

I've posted about Leatherbag countless times here in the past few years.  And I assure you, it's not been without good reason: For better or for worse, I've tried to take up the good fight of calling attention to music that's honest and well-crafted, while exposing music that panders to cheap nostalgia and cheap weekly-trends.  Leatherbag has consistently fallen into the former category, especially after the release of Love & Harm in 2007.  Now Leatherbag is prepping a new album for the catalog that takes everything I once knew and loved about the band one giant leap forward.

Leatherbag is, for all intents and purposes, Randy Reynolds.  Reynolds first appeared on the Austin scene in 2006 with the release of Love Me Like The Devil on Superpop! (home to Brother Machine and The Archibalds).  Drawing the proper singer-songwriter comparisons to Cohen, Dylan and the like, Love Me Like The Devil and the follow-up LP Nowhere Left To Run are still accomplished releases, wrought with the acceptance of past mistakes and those not yet made, and the will to reluctantly push forward.  Those releases are still some of Reynold's most rewarding recordings, but like most folk records, they do require the proper attention span.

And then like Dylan-gone-electric (but without the popular backlash, or European tour), 2008 saw a sea-change for the Reynolds.  First there was Love And Harm, clearing the air with the clamor of electric guitars and drawing new comparisons to the likes of Modern Lovers and Summerteeth-era Wilco.  To an extent though, Love And Harm had the feel of a juiced-up folk record, either a token of Reynolds quick transition to electric or a stylistic choice.  Regardless, from then on it was no-holds-barred for Leatherbag (or no-bears-barred, as the cover of Hey Dey suggests).  After producing the Jude/Ross album, Reynolds poached pieces of the Jude/Ross backing band to fill out the now-former singer-songwriter's blind spots on a string of EP's. 

As if to test the limits of his new sound, the EP's were all over the map (and the studio).  For a back-seat muse, Reynold's had turned to the New Sincerety movement that sprung up in Austin in the late 80s (arguably, the most successful New Sincerity band of the time was The Reivers, whose John Croslin went on to produce for Spoon).  In these EP's we saw Reynolds actively defining that sound, pushing against what he saw as the self-indulgence of the "singer-songwriter" with biting-sarcasm in his lyrics and the teasing jangle of power-pop in his music.  A gig at Austin City Limits, and shows opening for Robyn Hitchcock and others provided more trial runs and continuous experimentation, all of which presumably led to the new album.

Hey Dey, which comes out on May 18, is the bookend to that transition from singer-songwriter.  Here, Reynolds is comfortable at the intersection of cynical jabs at "the singer-songwriter who thinks that he's entitled" and confidence in the realization that with rebirth there is new opportunity to apply oneself ("it's time to do what's right, it's time to live you life / it's time for you to stop all this talking and start all over again").  The singer-songwriter gig usually takes a passive perspective, calling out life on its paradoxical failures and praying for hope and redemption three chords at a time.  Hey Dey is a right "fuck you" to all that: it's about taking control of the present, recognizing the dramatic ironies and the injustices of life but also the redeeming power of actively being true to oneself.  Wrapped up somewhere in that truth are themes of love, music and the ghost of Austin past.

The new sound of the EP's makes a stunning debut here, bounded by a more controlled application of the power-pop experiments but with same persuasive energy.  Never does the album feel rushed though, despite its driving rhythms and sonic breath.  On all accounts, Leatherbag is comfortable in this new incarnation, no doubt encouraged by Michael Crow of Grand Champeen at the producer's seat.  The production quality (recorded to tape and mixed digitally, to my knowledge) isn't something I'll go into, but suffice it to say production junkies like myself won't be disappointed with all the warmth surrounding the album.

True to my proprietor's nominal taste in album coverage, we'll sample Track One of the new album, Start All Over Again.  If anything, take this track as a thesis for what the album sets out to prove.

:Leatherbag - Start All Over Again:

See Leatherbag on either May 8th with Grand Champeen at the Continental Club, or at the 'Hawk for his album release show on the 18th.
 

- John Michael Cassetta -



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