Sound & Fury: 130 Miles to Eden with Sturgill Simpson
Listening to “Sound & Fury” in the parking lot of the Eden, North Carolina McDonalds. Photo by Andrew Donaldson
Spending the better part of a Saturday chasing that long white line brought to mind that the drive to Eden and back would be the perfect time to revisit the artist who sang about doing just that. I first discovered Sturgill Simpson through Chris Bradley’s Saturday Spin featuring his Sound & Fury album. By that point, it was watching a movie after having already read the spoilers; the controversy of a country maven going rock, losing his record contract, then abandoning both to give the world a retaliatory double bird — or at least a double album — of bluegrass cuts, both old and new, had played out.
What a story. I was hooked immediately.
So driving to Eden — not the Biblical one, the North Carolina one snuggled up against the Virginia border — was the perfect time to listen to Sturgill Simpson breaking his own mold straight through, and then again. As much as I loved the album the first time I listened to it, I swear it was better this time around, even though the individual songs have been in my streaming playlist ever since. Driving the roads and hearing the album straight through really brought into perspective the achievement of the artist that crafted it.
But not everyone agrees with me, of course.
When you’re the fan of an artist that has produced what many consider a definitive country record in Metamodern Sounds in Country Music, and a Grammy Award for Best Country Album for its follow-up A Sailor’s Guide to Earth, the first four songs off Sturgill Simpson’s divisive 2019 album Sound & Fury must have been a real baptism of auditory fire for the hardcore country fans.
The opening sound effects of footsteps on gravel, the slamming of a car door, the rumble of a V8 engine, and the searching static of the radio tuning sets the table. Then the opening instrumental track Ronin kicks in with a bass riff and guitar jam that announces with firm authority that this is not going to be a country record. It flows directly into the second track, the slightly faster but still bass-heavy Remember to Breath. It takes almost five minutes of real time before we hear Sturgill Simpson’s voice, and even then, with the way the album is mixed, the instruments are up front and his voice almost more backing track than lead. Then the synth sounds and guitars really get their rock on, Sturgill hits some high notes, and as soon as it started — or seemingly started at only 2:56 seconds long, Remember to Breath give way to the sudden blaring stomp-clap inducing ruckus that is Sing Along. The third track again increases the tempo, along with the guitar distortions and other sonic sound effects that would have the hardcore honkytonk crowd running for the doors if not assaulting the stage. By the time you finish with the fourth track, A Good Look, anyone looking for how Hank would have done it would be truly lost. With a sound that comes off like ABBA’s Benny Andersson spent a three day bender in Muscle Shoals Sound Studio with 70s-era Skynyrd and decided to commit the bastard sonic child that resulted from the unholy union to tape, anyone looking for A Sailor’s Guide to Earth would think they were truly off the map, and here there be monsters. Loud ones.
That’s just the first four tracks. If the modern country fan made it that far, it only gets funkier from there.
Sound & Fury brings both in decadent and luscious portions, but ebbs and flows while delivering its heretical musical sermon. The first four songs building speed and intensity until the fifth eases off the gas. The six goes back to straight grungy rock that could have come from Soundgarden as much as from the iconoclastic Kentuckian Simpson. The twists and turns at the heart of the album oscillate between funk and rock before cranking the distorted guitars back up to blaze off with the finale and one last blast of radio noise to see you off to whatever road lies ahead. It’s unique, original, genre-bending, it has an anime film on Netflix to go along with it, it is supremely wild and weird. Sound & Fury is brilliant.
Sturgill Simpson had to have known, at least in part, what was coming when he slid this little gem of defiance into the liner notes of Sound & Fury
Liner notes for Sound & Fury. Photo by Christopher Bradley
There is a better than even chance that the entire Sound & Fury project, including the anime film accompaniment, was a coordinated effort to get Sturgill Simpson out of his record contract, engineered by none other than one Sturgill Simpson.
Maybe if you don’t want to be on a record label anymore, you make a record they can’t market, then you get them to spend a million bucks on an animation film and refuse to promote it, and leave them holding this giant un-recouped debt. Maybe the bean counters will make a decision for me. I can go back to just doing it myself better than they do. That’s what I’ve learned. Because they don’t know what the fuck to do with me. I’m not going to give them (Elektra Records) anything ever again, so I guess I’m done…I was manipulated into thinking I needed a record contract when I knew I never did, by certain individuals who aren’t even in my life anymore, because they had their own back-channel deals working behind the scenes that nobody tells you about until the ink’s dry. So, that’s lessons learned
Regardless of the motive, the method worked. Make no mistake; Sound & Fury is an Album — capital “A” — in the best meaning of the term. It’s cohesive in sound and themes start to finish. Listening to it straight through on a road trip really reveals its craftsmanship, with little musical and lyrical call-backs throughout. And the country folks who once hailed Sturgill Simpson the second coming crucified him for it. Like the most famous person ever crucified, he warned them — repeatedly — ahead of time that this was going to be very different than what they expected. “F@#$ Your Speakers” is not subtle messaging. If they didn’t believe, that was on them, as far as Sturgill was concerned. The Gospel According to Sturgill Simpson ended not in an offer of salvation, but by telling the critics they could, both corporately and individually, go to hell, as he was going to seek redemption by going bluegrass.
Time will tell if Sound & Fury was a one off, a brilliant comet across the mostly dark musical sky that fosters sameness and trends and adherence to streaming category genres, or the first hint of more to come. An artist like Sturgill Simpson who can respond to hatred for his rock opus by forming one of, if not THE, as he contends, greatest bluegrass groups in the world should not be considered predictable. I certainly hope he finds room in his continuing musical journey to break out the distorted guitars and enough synth to make the Valvoline factory jealous. If Sturgill Simpson’s creative scratching of his current traditionalist itching ever wanes enough for more funky rock, the world would be the better for it.
Not to put too fine a point on it, but Sturgill Simpson can do whatever he wants to my speakers, and I’ll be inclined to say “Thank you, sir, might I have another.” Especially when chasing the various long white lines I have to drive down going about my own life. Critics and haters be damned. Lesson learned.
