Iron & Wine: Light Verse (Coloured Vinyl LP)
When the pandemic began, and the world shut down, so did the process of creating for Iron & Wine’s Sam Beam. In its place was a domesticity that the singer hadn’t felt in a long time, and although it was filled with many rewards, making music was not one of them.
The journey back began with a recording session in Memphis to record a handful of Lori McKenna tracks for the EP Lori with friend and producer Matt Ross-Spang.
Soon a series of short tours were booked entitled Back To Basics, which, out of necessity, were solo acoustic shows in smaller venues. They had an unspoken weight to them for Beam and the audiences alike, and also an incredible sense of relief for finally sharing art together and being back to work! A larger tour with Andrew Bird followed in the summer of ’22, and Beam was inspired even more by the excitement of collaborating with Andrew and his band and the warmth of musical friends.
Beam lyrically once again takes focus on a series of both fictional and personal insights, filled with desperate characters and wide-eyed optimists, offering promise and a dose of heartache, tears and laughter, life and love. Taking stock in the album’s title, he jokes, “Light verse is a form of poetry about playful themes that often uses nonsense and wordplay, and it’s my first official Iron & Wine comedy album!…. Just kidding….”
While true this may be Iron & Wine’s most playful record, Beam says the title mostly reflects the way the songs were born with joy after the heaviness and anxiety of the pandemic. Where recent records like Beast Epic or Weed Garden gave air to the disquiet of middle-aged frailty and brokenness, these songs trade that for the focus acceptance can bring. Moment by moment, they delight in being pointed or silly (or both) and attempt beauty over prettiness.
Light Verse arrives April 26th, and it’s Iron & Wine’s seventh full-length overall and fifth for Sub Pop Records. Fashioned as an album that should be taken as a whole, it sounds lovingly handmade and self-assured as a secret handshake. Track by track, its equal parts elegy, kaleidoscope, truth, and dare.
Limited edition yellow transparent vinyl version.
- You Never Know
- Anyone's Game
- All In Good Time
- Cutting It Close
- Taken By Surprise
- Yellow Jacket
- Sweet Talk
- Tears that Don't Matter
- Bag Of Cats
- Angels Go Home