Americana royalty Portland-based country-soul band The Delines have announced details of a new album “Mr. Luck & Ms. Doom” due out 14th February via Decor Records. Known for their character-rich storytelling and soulful Americana sound, the band have also shared the album’s first single, “Left Hook Like Frazier”, which is described as a “cautionary tale of love, heartbreak, and the risks of seeking comfort in the wrong places.” You can watch the video for it below.
The spark that ignited “Mr. Luck & Ms. Doom” came from a night in Dublin, Ireland, when after a gig singer Amy Boone took songwriter/guitar player Willy Vlautin aside and said, “Listen man, you have to write me a straight up love song where no one dies and nothing goes wrong or I’m going to lose my mind.” When the tour ended, Vlautin holed up at home and went to work.
At the next Delines rehearsal he brought in “Mr. Luck & Ms. Doom”, maybe the most romantic Delines tune to date. It’s the story of two ragged misfits: a failed criminal and a depressive house cleaner who somehow hit the lottery in meeting each other. With that song the soul of the record was found: ragged couples on the run. Recording began at Bocce Studios with longtime collaborator John Morgan Askew. The record features Amy Boone’s world-worn voice, the cinematic production of Askew, and the horn and string arrangement of The Delines keyboardist and trumpeter, Cory Gray.
“I wrote a few others in that Luck & Doom vein, happily ever after songs, but they didn’t quite work and my poor old dark heart couldn’t take it,” Vlautin commented. “So I brought Amy in some others, drifter couples in love, romantic albeit a bit more tragic. Luckily she liked those, too.” Other songs on the new record include the tragic ‘Her Ponyboy’ – a reckless young couple, madly in love, who roam aimlessly across the US, ‘JP & Me’ – the story of a grifter couple gets sidelined when the man in the relationship goes mad, and the Bobbie Gentry influenced ‘Nancy & The Pensacola Pimp’ – the tale of a woman who gets revenge on the pimp who has an obsession with only three things: money, Nancy, and driving endlessly back and forth across the United States.
Midway through the session another thread began to appear of women on the skids who are trying to make good. ‘Maureen’s Gone Missing’ – a woman robs a drug operation and skips town, ‘Don’t Miss Your Bus Lorraine’ – a woman recently released from prison on marijuana convictions comes back to a society where marijuana is legal while she is now a convicted felon and can’t find a decent job, the aformentioned ‘Left Hook Like Frazier’ – a cautionary tale of how brokenhearted women sometimes get into relationships that break them even more, ‘The Haunting Thoughts’ – a woman who can’t shake the fear that the world she’s in is going to collapse around her, and ‘There’s Nothing Down The Highway’ – the brooding tale of a woman who runs from her life only to find that she can escape the place but not herself.
The album features the stalwart Delines line up: Amy Boone on vocals, Cory Gray on horns and keyboards, Sean Oldham on drums, Freddy Trujillo on bass, and Willy Vlautin on guitar. You can pre-order it from this link – look out for a review here on AUK nearer the release date.
They previewed a number of songs from the album on their last tour, including Left Hook Like Frazier, and they are right up there with the best of The Delines.