When U.S. atomic bombs exploded in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the blasts were so powerful that they incinerated people immediately and burned their shadows onto floors and walls. There are scientific reasons for this phenomenon, but it carries such a strong metaphorical punch that it carries a depth of meaning even beyond its empirical explanation: Humans-- and humanity-- are easily lost amid the collisions of countries and ideologies.
That Joseph Arthur has titled his fourth album Our Shadows Will Remain reveals his own conflicted emotions about life during wartime. On one hand, his fourth full-length album-- and first after parting ways with longtime label Real World and signing with Vector Recordings-- is informed by terror-era jitteriness, a fear of something worse than death: abject annihilation. Clashing with this paranoia, cynicism, grief, and disbelief, however, is Arthur's wavering optimism. The bright blast that vaporizes him may not be a terrorist's bomb, but the Rapture. A strong believer in God and an afterlife, he nevertheless fears death.
Always more naively sincere boho than detached hipster, Arthur left his apartment studio in his adopted hometown of New York and decamped to the relative safety of New Orleans to record Our Shadows Will Remain. The resulting album is not a drastic departure, but it does sound more expansive-- both geographically and musically. There seems to be a lot of distance in the album, as Arthur evokes both the Midwest (the brief "In Ohio") and Los Angeles ("Echo Park"), not to mention New Orleans and New York.
Arthur fills this space with music that melds the homemade beats of his one-man Come to Where I'm From with the live-band sound of Redemption's Son. The Prague Philharmonic Orchestra injects three songs with swooping strings and nervy anxiety. In contrast, drums detonate throughout "Stumble and Pain", creating an apocalyptic march. Arthur layers his vocals heavily on most tracks, harmonizing with an infinite regression of selves. On his first duet, "A Smile That Explodes"", he sings with New Zealand singer Julia Darling, whose crystalline voice dramatically offsets his grainy tenor and lends the song a somber, defeated tone.
Likewise, Our Shadows Will Remain is similarly moody and conflicted. While not as claustrophobic (or as bold) as Come to Where I'm From, it's much less hopeful and uplifting than Redemption's Son, which is significant: The progression in two years from hard-won optimism to bleak pessimism seems to mirror the national unraveling of post-9/11 solidarity into deep disillusionment and disgust in response to the invasion of Iraq.
But current events only partially inform Our Shadows Will Remain, providing a context for these songs but not necessarily a subject. Despite the plural pronoun in its title, this is a deeply personal record. In fact, as if mirroring his move from New York, the album at times sounds as though Arthur's main subject is retreat-- from society, from home, from friends and especially lovers. "I wanna try," he sings on "Puppets", "to get away from everybody else." The album ends with the blunt command "Leave Us Alone".
Here, as on previous albums, Arthur demonstrates his gift for emotionally direct songwriting, but the specifics often escape his attention. Occasionally, a lyric rings false, relies on cliche, sounds clumsily vague, or simply tries too hard ("like a ghost without an atmosphere his voice sang without a song"). There's a sense of futility and loss to his lyrics, but these slight gaffes are made all the more noticeable by gracefully evocative lines like the one that ends "A Smile That Explodes": "I write one more letter I won't send except for across the floor." Still, the overall meanings of this complicated album are never lost. These songs communicate a gnawing, almost unnamable hurt that drives Arthur not just emotionally but-- more crucially-- artistically. He wants to leave behind more than just a shadow.
