CHRIS KNIGHT: THE TIES THAT BIND

Chris Knight
Enough Rope
Drifters Church Records
Released July 11

Listening to "Enough Rope" is like thumbing through a book of short stories. The common theme? Hardscrabble characters, and a longing to return home -- whether home is an actual place or more of a comforting idea. Sometimes they're not one and the same.

There's a lot of tough talk in these songs, from the variations on the "don't mess with me" theme in opening track "Jack Blue" to a caution against trying to change a wayward man in "Bridle on a Bull." But Knight delivers such lyrics with sincerity, not swagger. His characters are endearingly simple, but they have depth, too. These aren't mere characatures of rascals and rogues -- they sound like the real deal, based maybe on people Knight has known, or maybe even closer to home. Paired with Knight's whiskey-soaked vocals (think Robert Earl Keen but lower, more menacing, or a really bitter and weary Bruce Springsteen) and roadhouse-band sound, the songs breathe life into the characters, and if the story that unfolds isn't your own, you at least get a sense of what it's like to live them for four minutes or so.

It's not a happy album, by any means, but little shimmers of sweetness break through the darkness here and there. On "Too Close To Home," we find a character that has something to live for, even though he's not thrilled that the realities of life take him far away from those things. And on the album's title track and closer, the character actually gets to the home that's yearned for in most of the previous 12 tracks, and you get the idea that he finds a little contentment there, too.