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Kevin Morby - Little Wide Open

This is my favourite album of the year so far. I’ve been reading the Border trilogy by Cormac McCarthy, so I’ve been on a bit of an Americana kick. This one though, is exceptional. Mr Dessner’s production can be a bit hit and miss for me, too quiet, too nuanced. This is his best production by far - how do you make things sound so big yet so intimate.

Perhaps he’s doing nothing at all. Because the songs are written that way. Because the songs are performed that way. Because the lyrics switch between the self, between a relationship and between the landscape. Because everything is about little, and wide.

And there is some exceptional songwriting here. What I love most about the songs is that they are written to be an album. I wouldn’t say it’s a concept album, but songs reference each other, and pull upon the theme of the southern landscape, or the badlands as Morby calls it.

While I’ve enjoyed every moment of this record, there are two highlights:

• During Badlands there is the line “Until the tornado sirens start harmonising” followed by vocals that mimic this. Like, shivers good.
• The emotional centrepiece of the album is Natural Disaster. Seven beautiful minutes equating life, love, loss to natural phenomena. With a final verse that leaves you broken.