Wilderness (The Handsome Family album)

Last updated

Wilderness
Handsome Family - Wilderness album cover.jpg
Studio album by
ReleasedMay 14, 2013 (2013-05-14)
Length52:41
Label Carrot Top, Loose Music
The Handsome Family chronology
Scattered
(2010)
Wilderness
(2013)
Unseen
(2016)
Professional ratings
Aggregate scores
SourceRating
Metacritic 76/100 [1]
Review scores
SourceRating
Allmusic Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar half.svgStar empty.svg [2]
The A.V. Club B+ [3]
PopMatters Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar empty.svgStar empty.svgStar empty.svg [4]
Robert Christgau A− [5]

Wilderness is the ninth studio album by the Handsome Family. It was released in May 2013 by Carrot Top Records. Wilderness is an often surreal concept album about nature, with each song named after an animal. [2]

Contents

The album was released both as a single album and a box-set version that included a companion book of essays and art by Rennie Sparks. [3]

Reception

The album was well received by critics: according to Metacritic, the album has received an average review score of 76/100, based on 9 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews". [1] James Monger of AllMusic noted the album's Kafkaesque, dreamlike quality, praising the "remarkably affecting" song "Wildebeest", about the death of 19th-century songwriter Stephen Foster. [2] A.V. Club reviewer Christopher Bahn described Wilderness as "one of the strongest, most cohesive albums of their career", calling it "rootsy, literary country-rock that's a little like a collaboration between Hank Williams and Edgar Allan Poe." He particularly praised Rennie Sparks' lyrics, which he called "less traditional verse-chorus-verse than short stories in song form, musing on the beauty and brutality of nature, the murky depths of the human heart, and forgotten tidbits of American history and myth." [3] Critic Robert Christgau called the music "uningratiating" but praised its subtlety and deftness, saying that "the tales themselves are why you first listen. But these are so fine you don't mind listening again." [5]

Track list

All tracks are written by The Handsome Family.

No.TitleLength
1."Flies"3:41
2."Frogs"4:41
3."Eels"4:25
4."Octopus"3:33
5."Owls"3:59
6."Caterpillars"4:41
7."Glow Worm"5:33
8."Lizard"5:12
9."Woodpecker"4:22
10."Gulls"4:20
11."Spider"3:54
12."Wildebeest"4:20

References

  1. 1 2 "Wilderness Reviews". Metacritic.com. Retrieved July 8, 2013.
  2. 1 2 3 Monger, James. "Wilderness - The Handsome Family". Allmusic.com. Retrieved July 8, 2013.
  3. 1 2 3 Bahn, Christopher (May 14, 2013). "The Handsome Family: Wilderness". The A.V. Club . Retrieved July 8, 2013.
  4. Arado, Matt (May 10, 2013). "The Handsome Family: Wilderness". Popmatters.com. Retrieved July 8, 2013.
  5. 1 2 Christgau, Robert. "The Handsome Family". Robert Christgau . Retrieved June 1, 2023.