Kevin Devine- Between The Clouds & The Concrete
Kevin Devine is no stranger to a cult following. His appearances with his friends in Brand New, The Get Up Kids, and Manchester Orchestra has earned him a loyal fan base that supports solid release after solid release. I’ve been a fan since 2008 myself, I discovered Put Your Ghost To Rest right before I saw him open for Jesse Lacey. After a brief period of silence following his tour with The Get Up Kids’ during their reunion, we get a lovely fall time present which is newest effort Between The Clouds & THe Concrete. And a Nirvana Nevermind cover record, if that’s your cup of tea too.
Between The Clouds & The Concrete might be Kevin Devine’s first ‘adventurous’ album out of all 6 of his full length LP’s. I mean that in the sense that he experiments with just more than himself and a guitar and simple alt-country melodies, similar to what went on with his last full length, 2009’s Brothers Blood. ‘Off-Screen’ tries to fit a rock mold but with his usual somewhere-between-Dylan-and-Elliott-Smith-ness but with a sprinkling of Malkamus. He continues that aesthetic all the way through into ‘The First Hit’. It’s not a bad look really, just something that feels uninspired. A few songs in, we get a taste of the ‘old’ Kevin Devine. Songs like ‘Wait Out The Wreck’ are indicative of Devine’s songwriting, and sadly it falls in a really unfortunate spot on the record, nearly at the end. The song feels like it could have been on Put Your Ghost To Rest or Split The Country, Split The Street. It has the proper trimmings of Devine’s music, everything coming together to work well. The follow up track, ‘A Story, A Sneak’ does the same thing. What I think makes these two songs the best on the record, is the way they take what he does on the rest of it album and put it in the Kevin Devine ‘formula’ and out comes something engaging to listen too without sounding forced.
Organs, drums, three guitars, harmonies; all things we’ve seen in past Kevin Devine records, just this time around, perhaps too bland. Maybe it’s the religious tone of a lot of the lyrics throughout the songs that really are holding everything back, I can’t quite say. If the focus is the lyrics, Devine’s voice is a little buried in the mix and at times is hard to make out.
As someone who’s favorite Kevin Devine release could easily be described as the ‘most bland’, Put Your Ghost To Rest featured the widest spread of his musical versions. It’s lyrically strong and can be musically engaging as well, even when just a single acoustic guitar. I rather sadly felt the same way about his collaboration with Manchester Orchestra members, Bad Books. The songs were there just something was missing that was supposed to make it incredible. No doubt there are people who feel that way about this record and the Bad Books record, I’m just currently at a loss to see it. I 120% support artsits branching out and doing something different than their usual, it’s refreshing and interesting to hear. A side effect of that can be putting something out that falls a little flat.
Out soon on Razor & Tie.
