Musicians who become parents sometimes feel compelled to write songs about it. But really, what is there to say? Every parenthood experience is unique, and also very much the same, and probably has been for something like three hundred thousand years since humans evolved. All the wonder or magic inherent in the process is deeply personal, and therefore dreary as hell when someone else sings about it. That’s a grinchy perspective, no question, but Shakey Graves—a.k.a. Alejandro Rose-Garcia—does little to change it on his latest, Fondness, etc..
The album is said to reflect the new contours of Rose-Garcia’s life with his wife and young daughter, who was born in 2024. That means these songs are in many ways about change as Rose-Garcia lets go of the easy, expansive self-absorption of a young artist spending much of his time on the road and takes up the much larger adult responsibility that comes with tending to a marriage and caring for new life. Shaping those parental realities into something more than general platitudes is the tricky part, and Rose-Garcia only partially succeeds. That’s not such a shock: the Austin singer, songwriter and guitarist has on his previous albums shown a penchant for embracing conventional wisdom in lyrics with a yard-sale philosophy: they’re true enough, if somewhat pedestrian and a little tattered around the edges.
Many of these nine tracks—two of which are instrumentals—lean toward the obvious, but there are flashes of depth when Shakey Graves is thinking about how parenthood reshapes your relationship with time. It’s a recurring theme on Fondness, etc. Rose-Garcia yearns to take it slow on opener “Don’t Change a Thing,” where he wonders whether “the better days have left me behind,” a relatable sentiment for anyone who has changed a blowout diaper at 2:43 a.m. Later, “On My Own” asks a question—“What would you do / Where would you be now / If it was just me and you”—that is impossible to answer without the ability to roll back the clock and try it all again. “Time Flies” captures the essence of the idea that the good moments in life fly by while the unpleasant ones drag. Though Rose-Garcia didn’t write it (New York singer-songwriter Frank Hoier did, and has recorded it a couple of times as Frankie Sunswept), a Shakey Graves musical arrangement featuring muted guitars, dusty drums and, by the end, a string quartet, makes it of a piece with the other songs on Fondness, etc.
Rose-Garcia has always been stronger as a musician than as a lyricist, and that’s true here, too. He’s a skillful, imaginative guitarist, and he plays many of the other instruments on these songs himself. The result is a more pared-down album than Shakey Graves’ 2023 effort Movie of the Week. Woozy synth wobbles through “Don’t Change a Thing,” and Rose-Garcia sings in a sleepy, plaintive voice while picking out dry lines on an acoustic guitar. The instrumental “Suddenly” does just fine without words, as Rose-Garcia plays a repeating guitar pattern over a beat like a ticking clock and the deep, resonating wash of cymbals. The other instrumental, “I Once Was an Ocean,” opens with birdsong before surf-noir electric guitar and a rhythmic acoustic part evoke the sound of post-World War II Hawaiian slack-key guitar.
By the end of Fondness, etc., Rose-Garcia seems to have made his peace with the upheavals of fatherhood. The song is a subdued, rootsy track that he sings while accompanying himself on acoustic guitar. It’s not clear whom he’s addressing, but maybe Rose-Garcia is offering his daughter his version of existential insight when he sings, “Girl it’s a long road, but well worth the ride.” [Secret Identity]
Eric R. Danton has been contributing to Paste since 2013. His work has also appeared in Rolling Stone, The Wall Street Journal, the Boston Globe and Pitchfork, among other publications. He writes Freak Scene, a newsletter about music in Western Massachusetts and Connecticut.
