Field Songs

If anyone has proven it's the singer not the song, it's Mark Lanegan. The former singer of the Screaming Trees has fashioned a solo career that relies on the chilling impact of his deep, dark howl of a voice. Whether he's delivering a set of covers, as on his previous release I'll Take Care of You, or expressing his ominous visions with his own self-penned compositions, it's the voice that ties everything together. Pianos float past. Acoustic guitars tinker in the background. The semblance of a small band forms. Feedback erupts as electric guitars pick up speed and aggression. Yet, it's Lanegan's sobering authority, the way he delivers a desperate line as the circus surrounds him, that makes everything he's recorded worth hearing. The disturbing quietude of "One Way Street," the nearly mirthful celebration underlining "No Easy Action," the hazy dreamscape looming over "Kimiko's Dream House" and the dead-end blues of "She Done Too Much" and "Fix" are worthy starting points. But any one of his albums from The Winding Sheet to Bubblegum are worth the time under the headphones for serious study.