Description:
The 6th release for Portlands Richmond Fontaine is a stark collection of bleak but fragile character studies and haunted atmospheres. The bare bones performances here are so stripped down and under produced, you can actually, at one point, hear the squeak from Willy Vlautins chair, upon which he plays acoustic guitar. This perfectly compliments the fact that he wrote these tunes while holed up in the Fitzgerald Casino Hotel in Reno, which sounds as likely to be the vantage point for these sharp, literary-minded tales. From the shadowy corners of the "biggest little city in the world" emerge the denizens of a broken hearted underworld - the sad gamblers and homeless not far from sight. There is depth and intensity in this muted, folksy offering, produced by JD Foster, which stands in high contrast to the bands usual offering of energized alt. country. Pete Gow at AmericanaUK.com deservedly rates this record a "9 out of ten." (Union)
