If we can count on one thing from a Chuck Ragan album, it’s honesty. The folk-punk multi-hyphenate, professional wilderness type and occasional Hot Water Music frontman has never avoided laying his soul bare through his music, and ‘Love and Lore’ is no exception. We haven’t had a proper solo studio album from Ragan since 2014’s ’Til Midnight’, and the good news? He’s as restless as ever, with a sense of longing for something he’ll never find screaming out from every subtle, steel-embraced note. “I’m always trying to do something different because I feel like if we’re not searching, we’re not learning,” the troubadour explains, and if you got into Ragan’s music through his road songs such as ‘Nomad By Fate’, then you’ll recognise that track’s same feral instinct in most of ‘Love and Lore’. The desire to constantly be moving seems to sit easier with him as he’s matured, and he’s made peace with his inner wandering punk.
‘Echo The Halls’ arrived last month like the first snowdrop of spring, anticipating the warmth of a new album. It feels like an apology for his absence: “I fell in love with the silence,” he roars, his voice as leonine as ever, in a softer, more romantic track. It’s not a song that sums up what ‘Love and Lore’ is about though. There’s a lot more of his Hot Water Music side present, reminding us that our beloved musical grizzly bear is also one heck of a punk vocalist when he chooses to be. ‘Wild In Our Ways’ is a choppy ode to the joy of remaining steadfast to the punk dream. “We’re not meant to bow out,” he shouts, and this could be a slowed down, adapted track from the band in which he made his name judging by the rapid guitar cuts. Just when we’re enjoying a more back-to-basics side to Ragan, we’re hit with ‘One More Shot’ of pure backwoods Country. Ragan’s always been comfortable including violinists in his band and completed his last tour with just an acoustic guitar and an eager pedal steel player, so letting his inner cowboy come out to play is par for the course rather than a shock. Paige Overton’s vocals on their duet add a touch of sweetness to his gruff hollering and while it’s easy to scoff at his country side, let’s not pretend that we won’t all be screaming the words this song from our chests when he tours next year.
Ragan’s still stuck between two worlds; his home life as a settled husband and father, and his desire to roam the world as a desperate corner busker. Knowing this, a lot of ‘Love and Lore’ feels like his personal meditations on this topic. The opening track, ‘All In’, has to be the song that emerges as the classic from his album. It reads like Ragan’s manifesto as he walks the line between roles and genres, equal parts the sound of stomping boots and twanging, dreamy rebuttal. “Let me know when you’ve found your sound,” says an anonymous character, perhaps some kind of woodland muse that inspires the finest of roughly hewn solo artists. It could even be Ragan himself, asking us if we’re any less rootless in our musical inspiration than he is. Either way, the pedal steel adds a gorgeous unreality. Then we’ve got ‘Winter’; a tight nervous song that erupts in a full Ragan wail as he runs “down to the river to wash out my eyes” and regain himself. ‘Aching Hour’ continues in a similar, steel-heavy vein, seeing Ragan grappling with his past, future and passions. Ragan’s more anguished tracks are always his best, and while obviously we want him to live his best life, it’s so pleasing to hear that all-encompassing roar burn out through the headphones in the way only his most raw songs can provoke.
No one wants to be the person who nails their colours to the mast and says “this is an artist’s best album”. It’s a risky statement, and implies that they couldn’t make an even better record in a year’s time, but it’s so tempting to refer to ’Love And Lore’ in similar terms. It has a far different and more refined character than, say, 2011’s ‘Covering Ground’ and it’s string of rousing fan favourites, but there’s more than enough resolution in this record for fans of Ragan’s previous albums. A sense of growth and wisdom permeates each song, and when viewed as part of Ragan’s journey, we get a real sense of trajectory. This album proves what an interesting songwriter he is, determined to tread his own path even when it strays from conventional genre boundaries. The one thing that can be said for sure is that Ragan’s fire glows as brightly as ever, and ‘Love and Lore’ is the album hat will keep you warm in the long winter before his next tour.
KATE ALLVEY