Wit's End
Cass McCombs, singer-songwriter born in Northern California in 1977 and currently residing somewhere in that State, is set to release WIT’S END, his fifth-and-a-half album and third on Domino, on April 26th. The result of two years recording in various homes and studios in California, New York, New Jersey and Chicago, Wit’s End was produced by Cass with Ariel Rechtshaid, with whom he also created CATACOMBS. Sounds that conjure the colors purple and black, this is his darkest record to date. It seems he is going deeper into the mania of a man buried alive inside his self-made Catacombs, banging the stone walls, crying to be let out, and enjoying the quiet away from the outside world. However, he is not a man afraid of his own shadow, for in this environment of complete darkness, no shadows can be cast. This is a world of total Feeling. Here, words become a catalyst away from the slavery of arbitrary Thought and toward Feeling. “With each release, Cass McCombs has proven himself a wordsmith of great economy and precision. His compositions, often sparse and non-traditional, paired with his melodies and arrangements, transform into subtly revealing songs, filled with depth of emotion and meaning. It is that precision that would lead one to believe that all the autobiographical material a person would seek about McCombs is embedded in the songs (and you'd be right) but then he would insist after the fact that your deductions couldn't be more off the mark about what is truth and what is simply artistic expression. Light in its darkness, claustrophobic in its panorama, distant in its intimacy, present in its timelessness; WIT’S END should be given one’s full and undivided attention” -Kris Gillespie, Domino Records
The enigmatic singer-songwriter returns with a dark set of songs backed by spare instrumentation and crafts what might be his best LP yet.
A soft-rock singer-songwriter with a subversive streak, Cass McCombs plays it relatively straight on Wit’s End, singing minimalist, funeral-paced songs in a pained, delicate croon evoking a creepy-crawly isolation. On the self-explanatory “Buried Alive,” McCombs can’t tell if he’s stuck six feet under with a rotting…
In several sometimes perplexing ways, Cass McCombs' fifth full-length outing, Wit's End, veers moderately but decisively away from the appealingly direct, rootsy indie folk of its predecessor, Catacombs.
If you judge a man by his music and stage presence, Cass McCombs may very well be one of the most depressed men to haunt your playlist.