Umami Music
Produced by Paul Bryan
The first verse of “Go,” the opening track on Glen Phillips’ sixth studio album Swallowed by the New, feels instantly familiar – hearing the moment when the easy G major acoustic guitar strums meet his sweetly throaty tenor is soul-soothing; satisfying. While listening to the album’s eleven tracks it never feels too far-fetched a notion that Phillips could be sitting in the same room as you, humbly sharing a few of his new tunes between friends. That intimacy with his audience is, and has always been, an important emotional component of his efficacy as a singer and songwriter.
At the risk of oversimplifying, Swallowed by the New contends with Phillips’ personal journey since the dissolution of his twenty-five year marriage. While his compositions have often occupied space somewhere between hope and heartbreak, he has perhaps never been more explicitly vulnerable – or enlightened. “It started out as songs about the end of my marriage and ended up as songs about waking up for life and not going dormant when big changes happen,” Phillips recently told Spokane, Washington’s The Spokesman-Review. “I wanted it to have optimism at its core. I wanted it to be looking toward the light instead of getting stuck in the darkness, because I have a tendency to get lost there.”
Painting with broad brushstrokes, the set is beautifully written and executed and represents some of Phillips’ finest solo work. His voice continues to be his ace – agile and emotive without ever being pretentious or overwrought. There’s still a youthful yelp when he reaches for his higher register on songs like “Held Up”, which is a bit of an anomaly among its peers with its staticky thump, or the gorgeous “Leaving Oldtown”. Fans have been hearing a sparser version of the latter during Phillips’ solo shows over the past year or so, but the weepy strings and soft percussion on the studio incarnation are lovely packaging for his achingly passionate lead.
There are plenty of other standouts that contribute to the album’s overall strength. “Amnesty,” which might come as close to a Toad the Wet Sprocket rocker as one will find here, has an irresistibly catchy, singable refrain. “The Easy Ones” is a pretty, folksy ballad – also notable for a harmony vocal with Phillips’ daughter, Freya. Album closer “Reconstructing the Diary” is an interesting, but pleasing, diversion whose rhythm gives a sly nod to Tin Pan Alley.
However, it’s “Grief and Praise” that fully and completely encapsulates the album’s intended message. “The title for this song came from a Martin Prechtel talk,” Phillips revealed to American Songwriter. “He describes grief and praise as being the mirrored aspects of love in the face of inevitable loss: Praise is grieving what we love and will lose, grief is praising what we love and have lost. I wrote this song three days into the recording of the album. I had been thinking about Prechtel’s concept and knew that I had left some things unsaid on the album as it stood. I knew I had to praise my children and my former wife, to thank them for the life we’d had together and honor the new lives we were all beginning. It’s the core of everything this record is about.”
Swallowed by the New is a master class in the singer-songwriter genre – often considered a figment of pop music’s past. Those who have ever seen Phillips perform live with just his guitar…eyes squinted, and neck craned, will be far from surprised that he’s produced an album that tackles the complexities of life and love with such candor – and such humility. Although he may never have projected that his most personal of reflections might somehow serve as any sort of mirror for a country in the throes social and political turbulence, Phillips’ lyrics are arguably prophetic – but even more certainly a timely missive for those who lean on music for consolation:
Though scattered and weary, the change is upon us
We are bound till the end, a family I promise
All that you love will be taken some day
By the angel of death or the servants of change
In a flood water tide without rancor or rage
Sing loud while you’re able in grief and in praise.