Biography
Adam Carroll sketches characters with a novelist’s style (“Bernadine”) and an alchemist’s precision (“Rough Side Accordion”). Proof: Let It Choose You. The celebrated songwriter’s seamless new collection doubles down on literate high watermarks past (2005’s Far Away Blues, 2008’s Old Town Rock and Roll) with a dozen vivid vignettes straight from the vibrant Gulf Coast region.
Unforgettable dreamscapes frame the journey (“My Little Runaway,” “Tears in My Gumbo”). “Cajun and Zydeco might be historical music, but I think it’s alive and well down there,” Carroll says. “You have to go to it and experience the culture to really understand it. You can’t get it online. I took that trip and I now want to take everyone with me.” His key discovery: The accordion. Carroll, who had never played before picking one up on a trip through Eunice, Louisiana, made a fast study.
“I got real fascinated with Mark Savoy, who builds accordions,” he says. “I got me a squeezebox from him and I thought to myself, Maybe I’ll make some room for it on the record. At the same time, I thought, What business do I have playing the accordion? Well, I have a buddy that says he thinks songs choose us if we can be an open channel for them. I bought a rub board and the squeezebox and thought, Maybe this is what I’m supposed to be doing. I do think the songs choose us.”
Ace songwriter Slaid Cleaves backs the notion. “There are only a couple of writers who consistently catch my ear and remind me of the subtle joy that great songs can bring,” Cleaves says. “Adam shows the gold in life's little details, as he follows the humble characters you don't see in the movies, like the accordion-playing convict on furlough or the senior citizen country singer who's ‘settin' out a tip jar that's as hollow as a drum/Back in '53 he almost made number one.’" Read that lyric again: An entire life story delivered in two lines (skip to it now: “Old Child Country Star”).
Carroll writes similarly tight and timeless prose throughout the album. “It's artisanal songwriting,” Cleaves says. “Never gonna be sold at Walmart, but it'll remind the fortunate few who stumble upon this scrappy, mom and pop store full of fast-disappearing, weird Americana, that great songwriting can connect you to your neighbors, your fellow humans, even your own jaded heart.”
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Profile Last Updated:
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