Popular wisdom says that it is even more difficult than achieving success to stay there. And perhaps this axiom is not without reason, even more so if we limit it to a current era in which musical novelties are measured by authentic avalanches and practically all of them share the aspiration of climbing to the top of the summit in the least. possible time. The field related to American sounds is not an exception to that constant battle to become, whether man or woman, with or without a cowboy hat, the new face called to be adored by the public, a cataloging equally desired by the various publications. eager to fill their booty with discoveries, no matter how fleeting they may be. That’s why Chris Stapleton seeming -deservedly- untouchable in his privileged status is a true achievement, especially taking into account his ability to develop this condition in varied and even antagonistic environments: whether singing the American anthem at a prime-time sporting event; collecting all kinds of awards; gifting compositions to other voices for his recognition and, perhaps most importantly, making his solo career an unavoidable reference for those ears especially versed in this type of rhythms.
Far from attempting far-fetched exercises that seek to heighten the attention of an audience that too often tends to detach itself from what is already known, his new work transmits the conviction of knowing which path he is called to follow, which results in keeping his thoughts practically unchanged. characteristic factors, including delegating the production once again to that authentic King Midas that Dave Cobb has become, who on this occasion is supported by Morgane Stapleton, the author’s wife who is not only in charge of certain instruments but also acts as a choir -sometimes almost inaudible- that gives the interpretation a sweeter echo. Pieces that continue to complete a puzzle that offers the image of a majestic composer, with a raspy and robust voice, who with apparent simplicity puts into play an equation that turns southern rock, a genre that inevitably extends a hand through the country heritage while with the another caresses the smoothness of soul, in a language suitable for searching through everyday experience and weaving a kaleidoscopic display of existential unknowns.
Given the artistic profile that defines Chris Stapleton, backed by undoubted technical excellence, when approaching with lyrical intimacy the description of that particular habitat that resides in the deepest heartbeat of the United States, we must not overlook a cover that shows his figure wrapped in twilight tones. A snapshot that is the reflection of a songbook that develops with afflicted verb although with a redemptive vocation. A landscape in which the eternal dispute between its ghosts and the need to overcome them, forces in constant friction to generate what is possibly the very engine of its nature, just as it is in the music of this brilliant author, in which once again country scenes of romantic evocation meet in his repertoire with those that radiate electricity through his lament.
And “White Horse” served as the album’s cover letter, paradoxically it is not one of the songs that most faithfully captures its global climate. Beyond the fact that the album is based on less forceful textures, the excessive epic of a song on which a torrent of instrumentation is poured comes to somewhat distort that harsh southern sound that, for example, we will find in all its splendor and intensity in a “South Dakota”that perfectly transports a desert and wild territory that even in its climax expands through a space inhabited by the hosts of grunge, making its portentous throat blend with that of the most inspired Chris Cornell. Moments that show that his roughness can be overwhelming but that in this current work, even when it approaches the blues, as in the song “Loving You on My Mind”does so by adopting a more cosmopolitan and refined setting, using conceptual gestures similar to Robert Cray rather than any rough performer.
Despite the importance that the soul punch holds in Stapleton’s background, its relevance was meant as a consequence of being diluted in a mostly rock context that he colored with black rhythms. A modified role in an album in which he becomes the authentic protagonist, and we are not referring to the quantitative representation of him but rather to the transcendence when it comes to assigning an identity to the group. And if it is about emerging as a reference in the purest expression of it, songs like “It Takes a Woman” They display all their grandeur by building bridges with masters of the stature of Al Green or Solomon Burke, just as they achievede “Think I’m in Love with You” through a more tense gear based on melodic lines that revive Tina Turner. A type of sounds that will establish an overwhelming coexistence with those more rural, giving us an elegant “What Am I Gonna Do”, distressing in its musical aspect – an ally of Dan Penn – as in a lyric impregnated with ethyl vapors, or a “Trust” who lets himself be guided by John Prine to verbalize his condition as a sentimental refuge against the sordid context. A combat between angel and demon that is staged in the succession of pieces such as the nude “Mountains of My Mind”where he reflects that inevitable vocation of a wandering spirit that clashes head-on with the twilight romanticism of “Weight of Your World“, in which he cries out for an empathy that fades again among the noise of glass, intoned through the “Springsteenian” push of “The Bottom”.
There is nothing missing from this one “Higher” To be a perfect album, it probably does have something left over, like that feeling of sometimes seeking emotional ecstasy in a perhaps too grandiloquent way, when Stapleton has shown that although he masters ripping his shirt, he is also a perfect conjurer at handling the silences, making his imposing voice echo in the empty space. Details, attributable only to those who are capable of exhibiting the greatest excellence, that do not blur a work that continues to mark Stapleton as one of the great talents that American sound keeps among its shelves. Capable of engaging in a conversation as equals with the listener, that closeness further sublimates a musical record that continues to talentedly trace that – clearly – eternal fight that human beings settle between the need to find, and offer, warmth. of a close heart and the drive to succumb to the dangerous charm of the abyss.