‘The Long Haul’ is the latest album from the Edinburgh-based Americana band THE WYNNTOWN MARSHALS, and follows on from their 2009 debut ‘Westerner’ which received plenty of critical acclaim.
This was my first introduction to the band which has a current line-up of Keith Benzie on lead vocals, acoustic guitar and harmonica; Iain Sloan on Electric and pedal steel guitars; Murdoch MacLeod on bass and Kenny McCabe on drums and percussion.
The album contains ten tracks, all of which would fall broadly within the American rock and country rock category. Whilst there must be thousands of outfits currently mining the Americana music category, what made ‘The Long Haul’ stand out from the rest was the song writing on a couple of tracks that are stand alone classics, such as ‘Curtain Call’ (nothing to do with the song of the same name by The Damned).
This is a brilliant piece of storytelling, a slow countrified ballad that details the story of a stage magician who descends into the mire of heroin and suicidal intentions after a slight of hand trick with a loaded gun had fatal results for the entertainers on and off stage partner: - “Here I sit in this dingy room. Alone with needle tourniquet and spoon/ Just me and a bed and the poppy haze. Here I’ll stay until they take me to the grave”.
In this song, there is no happy ending, as the magician decides that he can only find redemption and release with his own death: -“Here’s my curtain call, showtime again. Never thought I’d pick up this revolver again/ Maybe soon I can be with you again. It’s over... it’s over... it’s over now”.
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‘The Submariner’ is another excellent track about someone who disappeared when diving, and the question as to whether the disappearance was accidental: - “When you left they found the diary you’d written. It read just like a suicide note/ We knew then that you might not make it back/And we’d be haunted by the words that you wrote”. What really makes this track a killer is the stark lyrical imagery: -“You measured out your distance in fathoms/ And followed phosphorescent trails into the gloom/ It’s there that you stayed in that diving bell you made/ Now little more than a handmade tomb.”
This is a decent second album which cements The Wynntown Marshals’ reputation as being one of the best European-based Americana practitioners slogging around out there.
The Wynntown Marshals online
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