In between the release of FIELD SONGS and its follow-up, BUBBLEGUM, former Screaming Trees singer Mark Lanegan sang for hard-rock heroes both old (a reunited MC5) and new (Queens of the Stone Age), gaining both fans and famous friends in the process. Thus, all eyes were on Lanegan for BUBBLEGUM, which features guest shots by everyone from PJ Harvey and Queens leader Josh Homme to Izzy Stradlin and Duff McKagan of Guns N’ Roses. Fortunately, all this attention doesn’t seem to have fazed the sandpaper-voiced singer; despite the guest list, BUBBLEGUM is as dirty, gritty, and raw as anything in his catalog.

While much of Lanegan’s previous solo work is a mix of languid folk-rock, gutter blues, and the kind of grunge-mutated 1960s-psych influences that powered the Screaming Trees, BUBBLEGUM is lean, angular, and occasionally almost avant-garde. Simple, driving, Stooges-like riffs and rhythms abet minimalistic organ lines, heavily treated vocals, and a somewhat industrial tonal aesthetic. Notorious substance-abuser Lanegan’s post-rehab lyrics are no less ominous or emotionally harrowing for their expanded perspective, and he remains a challenging singer/songwriter eager to explore new sonic avenues.

Tracklisting
1. When Your Number Isn’t Up
2. Hit The City
3. Wedding Dress
4. Methamphetamine Blues
5. One Hundred Days
6. Bombed
7. Strange Religion
8. Sideways In Reverse
9. Come To Me
10. Like Little Willie John
11. Can’t Come Down
12. Morning Glory Wine
13. Head
14. Driving Death Valley Blues
15. Out Of Nowhere

Professional Reviews
Spin (p.120) – “[G]ruff stuff….[With] a genuine, slow-burning Leadbelly brutalism.” – Grade: B+

Entertainment Weekly (p.66) – “[I]t seems as if it were rising from a deeply dug well, especially Lanegan’s glowering pirate-in-recovery voice….He hasn’t sounded this focused in years.” – Grade: A

Q (p.121) – 4 stars out of 5 – “[He's] more alive and more vital than ever.”

Uncut (p.96) – 4 stars out of 5 – “[T]his is an entirely consistent record from a man who’s yet to make a bad one, and whose rasping gravitas has made him one of the great voices of our time.”

Uncut (p.75) – Ranked #6 in Uncut’s “Best New Albums of 2004″ – “[A] bleakly corrosive, yet strangely uplifting album that spits, snarls and nurses…”

Magnet (p.115) – “He expands his palette on BUBBLEGUM…A full-blown creative revival…”

Magnet (p.66) – Ranked #8 in Magnet’s “The 20 Best Albums Of 2004″ – “Lanegan does a few gypsy box-steps and a couple Seattle stomps, always dancing with his favorite partners: love and drugs…”

CMJ (p.6) – “His finest work yet swoons between nail-biting highs and strung-out lows…”

Mojo (Publisher) (p.84) – 4 stars out of 5 – “BUBBLEGUM is, in many respects, classic Americana, at its simplest level, wide-screen loneliness, the sound of rattling boxcars and rattling lung, of dusty roads and endless journeys.”

Related Posts
Mark Lanegan – Field Songs
Queens of the Stone Age – Lullabies to Paralyze

Mark Lanegan is best known for his years as the vocalist for the Screaming Trees. However he’s also been building a following for the last 10 years with solo albums that highlight his love of American folk and blues. Field Songs, his fifth album, continues in that vein with a collection of mournful, soothing songs of love and loss.

Field Songs represents a departure of sorts for Mark Lanegan. While retaining the acoustic atmosphere of his previous solo efforts, Field Songs incorporates Middle Eastern influences (”No Easy Action”) as well as experimental musical landscapes (”Miracle,” “Blues For D”) which elicited comparisons from critics to Tom Waits. Lanegan’s gravelly, gin-soaked vocals on “Don’t Forget Me” and “Fix” is balanced out by his delicate delivery featured on “Kimiko’s Dream House” and “Pill Hill Serenade,” which could be the saddest song the singer has ever written.

For a such a sparse and deceptively simple solo album there’s a long list of collaborators, including Richard Johnson (Dinosaur Jr) and Ben Shepherd (Soundgarden) on guitars.

Mark Lanegan has the ability to draw you in and keep you there and this album is no exception. It is truly classic!

Professional Reviews

Q (8/01, p.135) – 4 stars out of 5 – “…Much like Steve Earle or Leonard Cohen, he has the talent to transform life’s dissappointments and regrets into a work of real wonder and beauty.”

Uncut (8/01, p.94) – 4 stars out of 5 – “…FIELD SONGS is profound in wisdom and emotion…”

Alternative Press (7/01, p.74) – 7 out of 10 – “…Vocally, Lanegan is in top form….his best work yet…”

Magnet (6-7/01, p.99) – “…His most fully realized work to date…”

No Depression (7-8/01, p.126) – “…An album full of doomed gothic romance, pharmaceutical and drunken reverie, and blurry, sepia snapshots….you’ll be hard pressed to find anything more tempting than FIELD SONGS all year…”

Mojo (Publisher) (7/01, p.112) – “…Brutal, bleak, and Lanegan’s finest hour yet.”

NME (Magazine) (12/29/01, p.59) – Ranked #27 in NME’s 50 “Albums Of the Year 2001″.

NME (Magazine) (6/9/01, p.41) – 8 out of 10 – “…This is soul music. Not necessarily by genre…but by the virtue of the songs that lay their author’s soul bare….pitched somewhere between the last moments of clarity drifting off on junk-filled dreams and the ganzwing desperation between fixes…”