Lost Cause Lover Fool

Since their beginnings, indie folk duo the Milk Carton Kids have been associated with a hushed, melancholy brand of song as well as with effortless guitar technique, with both Kenneth Pattengale and rhythm guitarist Joey Ryan playing vintage 1950s-model Martin and Gibson guitars, respectively. With their fourth studio album, All the Things That I Did and All the Things That I Didnt Do (2017), they recorded with a backing band for the first time, before returning to the duo model. Since then, however, theyve toyed with instrumentation, and their seventh LP, Lost Cause Lover Fool, finds them incorporating banjo, mandolin, bass, and/or percussion on some tracks for subtle texture shifts on an album guided by the theme of transformation. At the same time, their music remains remarkably hushed. Banjo is employed on the reticent opening track, "Blue Water," a song that strolls in the company of memories along the riverside. The more fleshed-out "A Friend Like You" features Pattengale on mandolin, guitars, bass, and drums, although to call it particularly lively or showy would be a mischaracterization as the wistful tune circles through choruses that end in the line, "A friend like you could be the end of me." In a delightfully ironic turn, the most uptempo, uplifting song on Lost Cause Lover Fool is "Sad Songs," a confessional ditty with deft picking that bemoans amongst a celebration, "But I know how it ends/Youll sing along as I fall apart/Theres always a sad song living in my heart." With its more lyrical, Paul Simon-esque melody, "My Place Among the Stones" is another regret-laden ballad about an altering emotional moment. The album closes on "Young Love," which wonders if a past love was affected enough by their relationship to also remember. These songs are made all the more touching by tender, intricate performances that revere the small details and internal effects of life-changing loss, heartache, and self-awareness. ~ Marcy Donelson