Photo by Tom Smouse
Review: Grant Glad & the Soo Line Loons tell ‘One Man’s Story’ on new album
The singer-songwriter captures the scope of human existence
Grant Glad‘s voice crackles within a spooky, acoustic framework with “On the Ropes,” hooked together with harmonica and a ghostly quiver. Glad, who fronts the Soo Line Loons, bowls you over with a performance that seems to extract a pound of flesh. That’s the sensibility woven into his new album, as though he has nothing to lose and everything to gain. One Man’s Story cuts deep into the skin, leaving nary a vein or artery untouched. His very blood courses within the album, finding the singer-songwriter pulling frayed heartstrings out of a dark and dank and hollow place.
Across the meager eight-song project, Glad sculpts together a storyboard about what it means to grow up and navigate adulthood. Described as an “amalgam” of stories from men the singer-songwriter knew growing up in Minnesota, the album buckles beneath a weight of lonesome, heartsick emotion, oscillating between ripened wisdom and forlorn bellowing. Remarkably, Glad pulled upon such influences as acclaimed author John Steinbeck, and that tremendous feeling throbs like electric lights wrapped around each story. It’s novel-like sensibility entices you into each chapter and you yearn to know how it all ends.
From attending deer camp at a wide-eyed 13-years-old (“Gunpowder at Dawn”) to being crushed under old age (in the climactic and weary closer “Dancing at the Vfw”), Grant Glad leaves no stone unturned in his quest to not only present the span of human existence but to understand his place in that immense, amazing world. It’s not exactly his own reflection but it’s all inherently personal, intimate, and raw. Glad will knock you on your back with a 1-2 sucker punch, even on spoken word moments like “The Night Before Thanksgiving,” gentle strings crying and baying in the background.
One Man’s Story burrows deep into the brain. And Grant Glad is its lonesome visionary. It’ll have you crawling out of your skin and leaving behind the past’s hard truths, as they seep into and out of your body. You’d be hard-pressed not to learn a thing or two about living. And you may even be changed by the time the album’s haunting finale (which features an “Amazing Grace” reprieve) creeps into your ears.
One Man’s Story is out now on streaming and other digital retailers.
