Top-quality musicianship and finely-crafted lyrics from stellar singer.
With his sixth major release, Lee DeWyze marries his exceptional vocal talent to a collection of self-penned songs that place him firmly at the songwriters’ table. Still only 38 years of age, DeWyze has come a long way from the Sundays he spent as a child in Chicago listening to Cat Stevens and Paul Simon. Naturally shy, he developed into a stellar performer but in more recent times his musical pathway has turned more introspectively to the creative process.
Fans of TV series ‘The Walking Dead’ will be familiar with ‘Blackbird Song’, which went viral in 2014, and to date DeWyze has accrued around seventy film and TV credits. A resident of Los Angeles since the age of 24, DeWyze headed for the Bristol Rhythm and Roots Reunion festival in 2023. For those of us in the UK, that’s Bristol in Virginia-Tennessee, the border between the two states famously running through the middle of the town. Home of the Carter family and known as the birthplace of country music, it was here that DeWyze met up with cellist Dave Eggar and began putting down tracks.
Returning early in 2024 with just three songs, DeWyze rented a house while he finished writing and then took advantage of the vast talent pool available in the vicinity of Classic Recording Studios. With Eggar writing the string arrangements and studio owner Mike Stephenson co-producing and adding bass and drums, the credits read like a who’s who of Bristol musical royalty.
Every track bears the hallmark of their talent and DeWyze feels blessed that the musicians involved took the work very much to their hearts. He himself plays very fine acoustic guitar while vocally he soars above the mix. Away from the distractions of LA, the weeks spent in Bristol enabled DeWyze to channel his emotions into beautifully crafted lyrics. By way of illustration, take the opening verse from title track ‘Gone For Days’ –
“I found myself at the forest line
Where the trail wanders off and the sunlight dies
There were ghosts in the trees with unsettling eyes
Where the shadows feel at home and the darkness lies.”
Whatever was in the water, Bristol proved to be the ideal setting for DeWyze to realise his creative ambitions. Each of the nine songs takes a different stance on existence, some like ‘Dandelion’ and ‘Bloom’ reconciling past and present, others like ‘Wither’ with a sense of yearning for a peace to come.
The single release from the record, ‘Devil In The Details’ is deliciously doomy, banjo and strings combining with heavily reverbed vocals and hand claps and surely another destined for a TV or film soundtrack. Closing with the gentle ‘Butterfly Effect (Afterword)’, DeWyze reflects upon his life in California. Two thousand miles away in Virginia-Tennessee and maybe a little homesick, it’s a love song with subtle strings and DeWyze accompanying on guitar. It’s a beautiful coda to a fine album.
It’s a brilliant album! I may be biased though. But thank you, Americana UK for a great review.