ALBUM REVIEW: ‘Long Shadows’ is Roger Street Friedman at his Best

The title of Roger Street Friedman’s fifth album, Long Shadows, nods to the gloominess that often casts itself over our lives. For Friedman, those shadows may darken our lives for a while but, as he illustrates in many of the songs on his album, they dissipate to reveal glimmers of hope for a brighter day.
Cascading guitars launch the title track, an upbeat folk rocker that opens the album with reflections on the journeys of life and love that we all find ourselves traveling. We’re often wistful about the choices we’ve made, sometimes regretting them and sometimes grateful for them. The somber, gospel-inflected “Give It All Away for Free” delivers tales of the continual struggle between prosperity and poverty, recognizing clearly that “no matter in which bed we lay” it “feels like we’re all homeless souls.”
The “Banks of the Brazos’” shuddering minor chord blues retell the deeply disturbing tales of the torture and deaths of slaves on whose backs the city of Houston was built: “they found our bones/On the banks of the Brazos/Shouting out from beyond the grave/now Houston sprawls.” Friedman’s jaunty parable “The Land of the Leaf Blower and the Mighty SUV” comes straight out of the folk scene of the early ‘60s and also resembles John Lennon’s clever takes on the ironies of society. With tongue-in-cheek, Friedman pokes fun at the façade of safety and security and cleanliness constructed by material objects such as leaf blowers and Range Rovers.
“The Kitchen Window” is an exquisite little meditation on the enduring power of songwriting—and its shortcomings—and love. The album closes with the soaring hymn to the beauty of that “sweet morning light” that lifts the darkness of night and purifies the gloom of humankind’s ravaging of “God’s masterpiece,” the earth.
Long Shadows finds one of our foremost troubadours writing, singing, and playing at the top of his game, providing glimpses of insight into human nature in his thoughtful, and often playful, lyrics.
Roger Street Friedman’s Long Shadows is out today.