Lou Barlow’s efforts with grunge-pioneers Dinosaur Jr generally took a back seat to frontman J Mascis, while his subsequent work with Sebadoh and Folk Implosion was often unhelpfully mired in no-fi under-production. So his first real solo album, much of it recorded at his home in LA (home-emoh, get it?) sees him crawl from under the noise to deliver a very personal selection of indie folk tracks that bear comparison with the introspection of more mainstream singer-songwriters like Neil Young or Jackson Browne.
The title track reflects the domestic contentment Barlow has latterly discovered and which fuels much of the album. While that contentment might nullify the edge of former glories, it also reveals a talent for brave and ultra-personal statements untrammelled by the indifferent sound standards of much of his past efforts.
‘Puzzle’ has a cello that unerringly adds poignancy to a song in which Barlow’s voice is at once vulnerable and uplifting, the folksy ‘Mary’ is a real gem and the harmonies on ‘Mornings After Me’ are as sublime as you could want. Not that he’s entirely eschewed his past. In tracks like the envy-laden ‘Royalty’ you get hints of the alienation he once brought to earlier work, and ‘If I Could’ depicts a man beset by low self-esteem and badly in need of comfort.
Nor is it all good. His tribute to his cat, the truly mawkish ‘The Ballad Of Daykitty’, is akin to the cloying tweeness we expect from Sting. But all told, this is a personal and warmly uplifting album from a songwriter long due his time alone in the spotlight.