(2023) Bobby Lee - Endless Skyways      


Review:
Endless Skyways is Bobby Lee’s third full album and second release on Tompkins Square. Returning to the full band sound of his debut, the name “Endless Skyways” is borrowed from a line in Woody Guthrie’s This Land Is Your Land, one of the cornerstones of American music. That song’s mix of the terrestrial (“ribbons of highway”) and celestial consciousness encapsulates Lee’s brand of widescreen cosmic americana; a duality also evident in the album’s split between deep-fried rural rock and ambient country. Dusty boots but third eye open. Opener and lead single “Reds For A Blue Planet” inhabits a geographically different realm to any of Lee’s previous work, equal parts Michael Chapman’s Anglo-Primitivism and Tinariwen’s desert-choogle. Slowdive/Mojave 3’s Ian McCutcheon turns in a muscular drum performance, with just a hint of sleng-teng creeping into Mark Armstrong’s bassline. The title hints at an ecological frustration which radiates through the taut, spiraling, modal grooves. Origin Myths’ “Impregnated by Drops of Rainbow” is revisited here in full band garb, shifting gear from the 117 seconds of skeletal krautrock into almost 7 minutes of soaring Kosmiche Country, complete with a glistening pedal steel solo from Joe Harvey-Whyte. Neu Riders of The Purple Sage, if you will. “Thunder Travels To Loftier Mountain Heights” is a gradually evolving waking dream of gently chugging tremolo and delicate interplay between Piano (a rare foray away from the drums from Guy Whittaker) and Fender Rhodes, redolent of Brightblack Morning Light, or Spirit of Eden-era Talk Talk. Picture the scene; a gang of slow movin’ outlaws briefly glimpsing eternity after a rare downpour in the desert. McCutcheon’s drums echo through the canyons and out into space. The woozy swamp rock of “Acid Grassland” is a return to more familiar territory for Bobby; an ancient drum machine moseys along with a loping groove and riff straight outta Cosmo’s Factory. Joe Harvey-Whyte appears again with the most fuzzed-out pedal steel this side of Sneaky Pete on “Christine’s Tune”.  — bandcamp



Track List:
01. Reds for a Blue Planet
02. Impregnated by Drops of Rainbow
03. Thunder Travelling to Loftier Mountain Heights
04. Rainbow Reprise
05. The HR Manager's Beautiful Daughter
06. Let Us Now Praise Famous Grains
07. Acid Grassland
08. Gnostic Loners
09. Folsom Point Blues


Media Report:
Genre: alternative folk
Country: Sheffield, UK
Format: FLAC
Format/Info: Free Lossless Audio Codec
Bit rate mode: Variable
Channel(s): 2 channels
Sampling rate: 44.1 KHz
Bit depth: 16 bits
Compression mode: Lossless
Writing library: libFLAC 1.2.1 (UTC 2007-09-17)


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