ARTiST: Josh Ritter
ALBUM: So Runs The World Away
BiTRATE: 187kbps avg
QUALiTY: EAC Secure Mode / LAME 3.97 Final / -V2 –vbr-new / 44.100Khz
LABEL: Pytheas Records
GENRE: Folk/Rock
SiZE: 75.26 megs
PLAYTiME: 0h 53min 39sec total
RiP DATE: 2010-05-06
STORE DATE: 2010-05-03
Track List:
——–
01. Curtains             0:56
02. Change Of Time          4:07
03. The Curse            5:00
04. Southern Pacifica        4:22
05. Rattling Locks          4:28
06. Folk Bloodbath          5:19
07. Lark               3:05
08. Lantern             5:18
09. The Remnant           4:02
10. See How Man Was Made       3:27
11. Another New World        7:39
12. Orbital             3:32
13. Long Shadows           2:24
Release Notes:
——–
The fifth LP from neo-folk master craftsman Josh Ritter has been conceived as a
voyage of discovery. A shimmering aural and lyrical paean to humanityÆs
essential questing impulse, So Runs the World Away is also well-attuned to the
senses of yearning and of existential absence that motivate that impulse.
Populated with wandering mariners, lovesick Egyptian mummies, philosophical
chemists, mountaintop seers, grim polar adventurers, and recurring black holes,
RitterÆs exquisite collection of songs reflects back at those who once looked
forward.
RitterÆs chosen themes and tones on So Runs the World Away align it most closely
with his careerÆs early peak, 2006Æs sublime The Animal Years. Both records
possess a transcendent, celestial scope that dwarfs RitterÆs earlier, straighter
folk albums (to say nothing of their stopgap, the rollicking Historical
Conquests), but there are vital differences between them, too.
The Animal Years saw Ritter searching for the supernatural around every
riverbend and in every prairie coulee. When that song-cycle ultimately located
the elusive godhead in its shattering climax ôThin Blue Flameö, however, it took
the form of ôan old man wandering the halls aloneö. For all of the albumÆs overt
biblical imagery, Ritter could extract little comfort or meaning from religion,
embracing instead a robust humanism (ôonly a full house is gonna make it
throughö).
Existential riddles are again on RitterÆs mind through the course of So Runs the
World Away, but he subsumes the natural/spiritual dialectic so common to folk
music and zeroes in on the heyday of empiricism instead. A son of two
neuroscientists who nearly became a neuroscientist himself, Ritter has drawn
songwriting material from scientific subject matter in the past; one of his
earliest songs, ôStuck to Youö, amusingly deconstructed love-ballad clichΘs by
applying the stark logic of multi-syllabic scientific jargon to them. But this
time around, he reconstructs detailed tableaus from the history of late 19th and
early 20th century archaeology, astronomy, and exploration, outlining the
shadows of meaning cast by the Industrial AgeÆs last great sweep against the
superstitious unknown.
Following an iridescent meteor shower of guitar noise (ôCurtainsö), ôChange of
Timeö commences the albumÆs questing. Recasting the crashing sonic waves of
ôThin Blue Flameö into a manageably epic dreamscape of metaphorical marine
imagery, Ritter and his band craft a striking and immediate segue into what
becomes an increasingly idiosyncratic vision. Much of what follows has a
specific contextual focus, but ôChange of Timeö is simply, stunningly timeless.
This portrait of sea-bound eternity is succeeded by the lonely waltzing piano
rhythm of ôThe Curseö. A narrative of the unlikely romance between a reanimated
Egyptian mummy and the female archaeologist who unearths him from his tomb, ôThe
Curseö is the descendent of ôThe Temptation of Adamö, a narrative of an unlikely
romance in a nuclear missile silo that was Historical Conquestsæs imaginative
highlight. Both songs feature tumbling wordplay and mournful horn interludes,
and both come across as funny, bittersweet, and oddly touching despite the
expected ridiculousness of their highly-detailed subject matter. While
ôTemptationö stood alone amidst dissimilar up-tempo tracks, ôThe Curseö forms
the nucleus of So Runs the World Away. To employ one Egyptian reference point
that Ritter left out of the songÆs lyric sheet, it is the Rosetta Stone of this
album.
The albumÆs themes and sounds unfurl with gradual beauty from this point on.
ôSouthern Pacificö floats along with that classic American archetype, a restless
Western seeker (ôOver the wide plains / Take me to someplace newö). The metallic
cacophony of ôRattling Locksö accompanies a lyric that stings with the soft
bitterness of empirical existentialism (ôthere ainÆt nothing new about the world
/ that I ainÆt learned from just standing here in this spotö). ôLanternö and
ôLong Shadowsö contrast the earlier skepticism with stubborn, anthemic
hopefulness. ôLarkö is lovely and pure, conceiving of mountaintop astronomical
observatories as legacies of spiritual ecstasy. ôThe Remnantö, all angular
rhythm and organ stabs, begins as a foreboding chase through the wilderness
before expanding into a desperate cosmic apocalypse, while ôOrbitalö traces
endless circumferences with richness and joy. Even the adapted traditional
ballad ôFolk Bloodbathö has something to say about the impossibility of finding
peace even in death.
If ôThe Curseö is the Rosetta Stone of So Runs the World Away, then its thematic
bookend ôAnother New Worldö is too expansive to fit into any museum. The deeply
haunting story of a polar explorer who sacrifices the ship that is his only
companion in order to survive the icy desolation, ôAnother New Worldö
constitutes the elegiac and unsettling thesis of Josh RitterÆs potent new album.
So Runs the World Away, both the album title and the music it describes, is
redolent less of the thrills and exploits of exploration than of the sad beauty
of the unobtainable. Ritter suggests that the gleaming horizons aimed for by the
boldest among us can never quite be reached, and even the effort to approach
them comes at a great cost. And yet, we must quest on.
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