Tuesday 17 June 2014

Record Review - Jeff Lang

Published in the Shortlist section of The Sydney Morning Herald, Friday June 13.

Jeff Lang
I Live In My Head A Lot These Days
ABC Music / Universal

Jeff Lang’s latest record in a still flourishing career that’s spanned almost thirty years begins a capella, a few bars before that instantly recognisable slide guitar comes in, ‘Watch Me Go’, not so much a song as a story set to music.

This is the MO for most of I Live In My Head A Lot These Days – it’s certainly not Lang’s loudest or fastest record to date; one gets the impression, despite his guitar prowess, that this one is mainly about the songs, the stories, the tales he weaves about promise, fear, sadness and life. Indeed, he has a knack for making seemingly mundane observations appear mystical, ethereal.

Still set very much in the rootsy vein for which he’s known, and backed once more by crack rhythm section Grant Cummerford and Danny McKenna (with Greg Sheehan on board on percussion), this set stretches out gently but forcefully, a slow burner that affirms Lang’s place as not only a stellar player, but as one of Australia’s finest songwriters.
3.5/5

Samuel J. Fell



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