Owen: Avalanche Tour

Mike Kinsella’s work over the years with his various musical endeavors has been nothing shortof foundational, from early days with Cap’n Jazz right up until recently with American Football’sunforeseen and excellent second act. Even with his long list of contributions to course-settingbands, Kinsella never reveals more of his internal world than he does with the softly drawnsongs of his long running solo project Owen. With new album The Avalanche , he delivers a setof Owen songs that are the most straightforward and unguarded the project has ever been.The last Owen album, 2016’s The King of Whys showed up just a few months before AmericanFootball (LP2) , the first new music in over 15 years from the recently reunited group. Kinsellatook a relatively relaxed approach to his solo project in that time, playing rare occasional showswhen American Football’s rigorous touring schedule allowed. After several busy years workingwithin the collaborative framework of a band, Kinsella was more than ready for the completecreative control a new Owen record offered. He reunited with producer Sean Carey (Bon Iver,Peter Gabriel) and engineer Zach Hanson (The Tallest Man On Earth, Waxahatchee) anddecamped to snow-covered Hive Studio in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, just far enough away from theroutines and distractions of daily life to really focus on the process. The leaps forward inproduction and detail that first surfaced on The King of Whys advanced even further as TheAvalanche came together. The collaborative chemistry Kinsella, Carey and Hanson sharecomes into its own on these songs. The odd time signatures and intricate structures of pastOwen material are traded in for more fleshed out arrangements and direct songwriting.Echoes of the lo-fi bedroom balladry that defined early Owen come through on theheart-crushing “I Should Have Known,” familiar open-tuned acoustic guitars and weary vocalssupported by glowing string arrangements. “On With The Show” is bounding and upbeat, with ajangly instrumental standing in stark contrast to lyrics about crushing failure. KC Dalager fromNow, Now contributes guest vocals to several songs, most notably the glacially paced albumcenterpiece “Mom and Dead.” Layers of glimmering pedal steel and understated music boxpiano tones build into one of the album’s hardest gut-punches, stunningly pretty instrumentationgift wrapping lines as indisputably bleak as “Wake up, I had a dream you died.”The Avalanche takes on a new refinement, with spacious musical landscapes making room fordevastating lyrics that return to themes of an unravelling marriage and big endings. On previousalbums, sarcasm and wry humor would dull the sting of heavier lyrics. Here there are still tracesof Kinsella’s trademark humor, but instead of offering a winking dismissal of negative thoughts,it takes the songs to even darker places. Easily the most intense Owen album, The Avalancheis also the most beautifully crafted. Kinsella goes deeper than ever before, with self-reflection sopainfully blunt it’s sometimes difficult to look at head on. It’s a guided walk through one of life’smore difficult chapters, resulting in nine of the best Owen songs ever penned and an albumthat’s as heartbreaking as it is magnificent.