album reviews

Logan Springer Coyote- “kī-yōte”

LOGANSPRINGERMUSIC.COM

Coyotes tend to howl to locate each other and establish their territory, not only for the sake of those around, but also for themselves. It seems prudent then that Iowa alt-country singer-songwriter Logan Springer titled his fulllength debut, Coyote- “kī-yōte”. Engineered and mixed at Flat Black Studios by Luke Tweedy and released in collaboration with Long Play Records, it’s the first full-length album of original songs from Quad Cities-based Springer. He enlisted a few of his friends to flank him on the record, a powerhouse list of local musicians including Murray Lee, Ben Schwind and Phil Dodds.

Leaning on the album’s namesake, this record contains a lot of winter echoes, a lot of white space and long nights roaming it, searching for a place to settle down. The best songs capture Springer contemplating the trying time “before” and the altered “after” of leaving home. His lyrics try to simultaneously stake his claim to the spaces he’s known and justify leaving them all behind. The album’s first two tracks, “Nowhere Fast” and “Best I Can,” are built out of fast cars and bloodshot eyes and hard times that turn “black dirt into sand.” “Foreign” details the singer walking through the fields of his youth, for once back home from the city for something other than “weddings and funerals.”

Throughout, Springer emulates his influences without committing the persistent crime of “country music copycatism.” You can hear Jason Isbell in Springer’s pool hall duet “Together Alone” which finds Springer lamenting with fellow Quad Cities musician Angela Meyer about the type of trust it takes to make love work. Meyer also sings with Springer on “Long Winter Blues,” a pop country tune that veers straight towards Chris Stapleton territory, complete with Liz Mastalio’s gospel-soul organ backbone.

“Everything Gonna Be Alright” takes up as a modern-day Merle Haggard-style working person’s ballad, full of payday Fridays and skipping out on smoke because the singer’s heard that if you “stub your toe they got some dude that’ll come collect your piss.” And Springer goes for a Springsteen ballad on “End of the Road,” the album’s best song. It’s about that motel at the end of the road with weekly rates. I’m sure you know the one. Maybe you’ve been there too. It’s always raining on the parking lot while the welcome sign flickers its manic Morse code.

It’s the type of song that is several albums old, which makes its inclusion on Springer’s debut all the more impressive, rounding out a complete and sonically diverse alt-country record. That’s never been an easy feat. If Coyote- “kīyōte” is just Springer’s beginning, born out of and produced during an endless pandemic winter, it’s a first howl worth hearing. —Avery Gregurich

Elizabeth Zimmerman

Roots Of Rhythm

ELIZABETHZIMMERMAN.BANDCAMP.COM

The first song on Elizabeth Zimmerman’s Roots Of Rhythm, “The Journey,” is just her voice and piano. It brings Judee Sill immediately to mind. It combines pleasant, subtly modulated vocal style with an intricately worked melody and introspective lyrics. She presents to the listener as an inviting, fascinating mystery. The arrangement is masterfully simple. She brings in hummed backing vocals toward the end, so low in the mix that you wonder if they’re actually there. “Bending Blues” LEaNING ON ThE aLBUM’S leans on the blues pentatonic scale in NaMESaKE, ThIS rEcOrD the verse but moducONTaINS a LOT OF WINTEr lates in the chorus to EchOES, a LOT OF WhITE SPacE something poppier. aND LONG NIGhTS rOaMING IT, You could imagine SEarchING FOr a PLacE TO SETTLE DOWN. hIS LYrIcS TrY Sheryl Crow covering this song—but she wouldn’t use TO SIMULTaNEOUSLY STaKE the light touch hIS cLaIM TO ThE SPacES hE’S Zimmerman brings KNOWN aND JUSTIFY LEaVING to her vocals. ThEM aLL BEhIND. Zimmerman never raises her voice or belts the chorus for the back rows. She makes you lean in, and her voice is most powerful when it’s quietest. “Make Him a Poor Boy” stays in the blues pocket vocally, playing against a subtly dissonant repeated figure from her Fender Rhodes electric piano. The chorus breaks the tension, while remaining steadfastly bluesy. “The Nile” uses the same kind of “eastern” scale as you hear in the novelty song “Istanbul,” most recently made famous by They Might Be Giants. It carries a hint of nostalgia for a time when anything east & south of Rome was exotic.

“What I Need” adds atmospheric background sounds of unknown origin—synthesizer? violin? guitar?—that underpin an emotionally bare song with mystery. “I know what I need to get by,” she sings, sounding unsure whether she’s going to get it. “The Love We Can’t Do,” like “The Journey,” strays a bit from the blues into melodic pop. “Some kind of black magic holding true,” Zimmerman sings. “There’s voodoo on me to love you.” It underlines the constant themes of the album: mystery and uncertainty.

Zimmerman has an easy familiarity with the blues scale, and incorporates it into many of the songs on Roots Of Rhythm, bringing her unique spark. But the songs that seem most personal and original—“The Journey,” “Broken in Blue”—are the least tied to jazz or blues.

“The Wish” is a stunning song in that vein. As she performs it, it sounds easy and natural, but it would be a difficult song to learn, with its start/stop phrasing, instrumental asides and long verses. The melody peaks in long notes on the words “All my life wishing on a star,” and their simplicity feels like the sun coming out after the sometimes stormy verse.

Zimmerman is a natural singer, effortlessly tuneful and able to put great feeling into a song without shouting. Her piano playing finds a groove and rides it without unnecessary adornment, and it supports her voice perfectly. She can write and sing in a jazz/blues style, but finds her voice most purely on songs based in the pop vernacular. Still, this is a rewarding start-to-finish listen. If her music speaks to your condition, it will leave you wanting more. —Kent Williams