Lady Lamb—After

Alright, folks, we have to talk about Lady Lamb.

Instead of a Monday Cover of the Week I’m going to do a special Monday Album of the Week because it’s Labor Day and, more to the point, I can’t bring myself to wait until Friday to gush about After.

The only way I can start this off is with a quote by German Romantic composer Gustav Mahler. He said “a symphony must be like the world. It must contain everything.” After encapsulates that sentiment perfectly. This album has the whole world inside of it. It’s joyous, despairing, confused, confident, delirious, melancholy, beautiful, and strange all at once. Even with Aly Spaltro’s preternatural knack for concise, instantly relatable lyrics, that massive hodgepodge of emotions can make for an overwhelming listen. Yet, After is such an expertly crafted and bravely stated collection of songs that it never leaves you behind.

Take, for example, the album’s opener, “Vena Cava.” The song is named for one of the two large blood vessels that take oxygenated blood to the heart and deals with, in no small part, the inevitable breakup of a relationship that hasn’t even hit trouble yet. At the same time, it’s a straightforward, shout-along anthem that rocks with the best of the genre. Under its rollicking exterior Spaltro hides some lyrical gems that are as hilarious as they are wrenchingly immediate. My personal favorite is “I can feel how the seams of your ribs/Will separate from the seams of my ribs/I know already how much TV/Will fail to comfort me in your absence.” It’s that ability to find the humor in the sad moments (and vice versa) that makes Spaltro such an impressive lyricist andafter such an incredible album. Artists rarely ever reach that kind of uncontrived profundity, and even less often by their third — second wide release — album.

Although Spaltro’s lyrics give the star turn on After, the record is no less impressive or engaging from a musical perspective. The songs strike the elusive balance between variety and consistency. No one song sounds quite like the last, but neither is there ever any question that they came from the same pen. Even outliers like the spectacularly adventurous, wonderfully strange “Violet Clementine” are unmistakably Lady Lamb. Spaltro’s voice does a lot of work in that department. It’s an incredible instrument that is equal parts smoky and sweet, but can howl with hurricane force when she wants it to.

Some of the most exciting moments on both After and Lady Lamb’s debut,Ripely Pine, come when Spaltro pushes her voice to its very limits or even beyond. “Milk Duds,” a bittersweet ode to a bygone relationship, is so poignant not just because of the lyrics — although I challenge you not to get misty-eyed when you hear “I am an old song that you once knew/You can’t remember me for the life of you/But I hope you find joy in all the things you do/And in these songs we sing that are sung solely for you.” It’s also in the way the chorus reaches up to notes that Spaltro can barely hit. It lends a sense of desperation to the song, as if she needs to get these feelings out, even if they’ll never present themselves neatly or simply. There’s a power in the unwillingness to sand off one’s rough edges. After could be more polished or never push Spaltro’s voice from the ranges at which it sounds most beautiful, but in the process it would lose a great deal of what makes it so special.

All of these factors come together on the album’s emotional fulcrums: “Sunday Shoes” and “Ten.” The former is a heart-wrenching story about the loss of an older sister. From its gorgeously simple picked acoustic guitar riff to the devastating final minute beginning with “and you will become your most favorite color” “Sunday Shoes” generates genuine pathos without becoming maudlin. It has a very specific narrative, but its themes are universal. It concerns the kind of love and loss that all of us experience at some time in our lives, and it conveys a message that we all want to share: “I miss you. It’s unfair that you’re gone, but I’m okay. I hope you are, too.” The ideas it explores, paired with its beautiful melody and an incredible performance make this essential listening.

“Ten” pulls at the heartstrings in a completely different way. Like “Sunday Shoes” it spins a personal story that digs up more widely experienced emotions. At its heart it’s an exploration of beloved memories. I may never have lived in the American Southwest, but I have my own “sandbox in Arizona.” My mom has never seen “an eagle with a fish in its mouth,” but she’s shared cherished recollections with me and my brother. The brilliance of Lady Lamb’s music and Spaltro’s lyrics is her ability to share and describe emotions in such a way that you experience them yourself. Her music is made of the ghosts — good and bad — that haunt all of us. It’s an opportunity to remember them fondly or bemoan them, but always to thank them for making each of us who we are. The album’s final line from wonderful closing number, “Atlas,” couldn’t be more perfect. Spaltro sighs out “I know where I come from.” That, in a nutshell, is After. It becomes a journey about discovering, reckoning with, and accepting what makes you “you.”

Every once in a while an artist or an album comes along that says what you’re feeling or describes you in ways you could never adequately express yourself. Typhoon’s incredible 2013 album, White Lighter, and Lady Lamb’s After are mine. It’s easy to break anything down to its elements and talk about why it’s Good or Bad, but our connection to the music we care about most goes deeper than that. I don’t know anyone who loves — I mean really LOVES — a song or an album because the lyrics are well-crafted or the instrumentation is interesting. We love the things we love because they reach deep inside of us and bring something out we didn’t know or couldn’t describe before. I can’t completely put into words how important this album is to me, nor can I adequately describe how incredible I think it is. All I can do is ask that you give it a listen. I can’t guarantee you’ll love it end to end, but I can promise you that something in this album will touch you. Hopefully it’ll make you think on something or someone you haven’t in a long time.

In any case, thanks for reading. It’s a joy to get to share the music I love with every single one of you.

Essential Tracks: “Vena Cava,” “Sunday Shoes,” “Milk Duds,” “Ten,” “Atlas”