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Cass McCombs

Catacombs

Domino | 2009 | Album

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Cass McCombs has one of those voices that you thought had disappeared with the late ’50s and early ’60s . . . one that brings to mind the rich loneliness of Ricky Nelson’s “Lonesome Town” or the adolescent sweetness of the Everly Brothers.

McCombs’s fourth full-length album, Catacombs, shows the silken-voiced singer-songwriter to be a master of the pop songform. There are few twists in the music; few unexpected texture or time changes. Nearly every composition follows the conventions of poppy alt-country coffee shop folk to a T. But the songs are so perfectly constructed; the musicianship so perfectly understated; McCombs’s voice so sweetly intoxicating that you can’t help but be swept away by the music.

Catacombs’ songs are largely built around the sounds of McCombs’s reverb-haloed vocals and sparse acoustic guitar work. Light steel guitar, barroom piano, and alternately feathery and heavy-handed drums color the pieces with ethereal alt-country flavor. There’s the bass-thud heavy four-to-the-floor stomp and ghostly organ of “Lionkiller Got Married.” The Roy Orbison-reminiscent earworm vocal hooks of “My Sister My Spouse” and “Dreams Come True Girl.” The infectious country-folk bounce of “One Way To Go.”

While there’s certainly a dark loneliness that peeks through the lightness of the music (“Don’t Vote,” “The Executioner’s Song”), Catacombs is a feel-good album full of perfect pop compositions that refuse to leave your head alone long after the music has stopped. And after fifty-four minutes of music, you’re left wanting more. At a time when the traditional popular songform seems completely exhausted, McCombs stands as a perfect and rare example of how powerful the formula can be when stripped of superfluous production and put in the right hands.

Hannis Brown