Jay Farrar – Stone, Steel & Bright Lights

Jay Farrar’s appeal has always been as much in his sound as his songs. It’s a sound that has remained remarkably consistent through several bands and settings. Over his career, the musical backdrops have varied from traditionalist country to naked acoustic folk to raging, feedback-drenched rock. But a few things stay constant: his rugged, diesel-fueled voice and a determinedly dark sonic palette. There’s a persistent severity to Farrar’s music, a melancholy verging on grimness. Even when he cuts loose, he never exactly sounds like he’s enjoying himself.

That could make a live album a dubious proposition. But this well-recorded and carefully mixed set, taken from his recent tour with New York City rock band Canyon as his backing crew, works precisely because of Farrar’s almost ascetic approach. What it lacks in joy and fizz, it makes up for in conviction. (It will be released June 8 on Farrar’s Transmit Sound label; a bonus DVD, featuring eleven songs from a January 23 show at Slim’s in San Francisco, will be packaged with the disc.)

The most obvious complaint is that, as Farrar’s first proper live album in any of his guises, Stone, Steel & Bright Lights limits its selections to his post-2000 solo career. That means no Uncle Tupelo and no Son Volt. So instead of the career retrospective Farrar (or at least his avid following) deserves, we get a summary of his most recent activities. There’s nothing surprising about this, as Farrar has never been much for looking back. But for those who rank, say, “Whiskey Bottle” or “Tear Stained Eye” among their favorite songs, it’s inevitably a little disappointing.

Still, Stone, Steel & Bright Lights is a persuasive argument for the here and now. Drawing evenly from 2001’s Sebastopol and 2003’s Terroir Blues, it’s balanced between slow-burning brooders such as “Heart On The Ground” and stomping rockers such as “Fool King’s Crown”. “Damn Shame”, which Farrar released in funky remixed form on the 2002 ThirdShiftGrottoSlack EP, actually boogies a little.

Two new songs find Farrar in surprisingly political form. “Doesn’t Have To Be This Way” bemoans “election by decree in this new world of shame,” and the solo acoustic “6 String Belief” is an almost punky call to arms: “Corruption in the system, a grassroots insurrection/Bring them down, we’ll bring them down.” The album closes with two covers, Pink Floyd’s “Lucifer Sam” and Neil Young’s “Like A Hurricane”, that show the force of Farrar’s personality: They both sound like they’re his.