Album Review: The Jayhawks - Sanctuary Park

You never know what you're going to get when The Jayhawks release a new album. Sometimes, they are exploring Americana, and sometimes they are exploring sonic texture. That makes them 'interesting', but also one of those bands that is incredibly frustrating to follow, because I'm not sure how many people are as fond of the wide range of sonic experiments they have played with over the years. I can say I am not one of those who enjoys their more left-field works, preferring when the band sticks with the tried-and-true that highlights their melodic gifts.

This new album is interesting because what it reminds me most of is "Back Roads And Abandoned Motels", the odds and ends collection that brought together songs that had come from all different sources, played in a collaborative way. This record is similar in that it doesn't venture far from the core of the band's sound, but it also feels like everyone is contributing more than usual to the overall result.

You could say that also makes this a bit like "Rainy Day Music", which is a favorite of mine, but that record was a finely-tuned set of utterly infectious songs, while this one is even more somber and restrained. When they do put a bit of energy into the mix, like on "Keeping Our Heads Above Water" and "Hands Upon The Wheel", it's The Jayhawks that I love, and want to hear. When they fall into more folk-leaning songs, the slow tempos and pensive delivery can become a bit of a drag. Those are times when the band's former incarnation would have come in handy, as the days of dueling vocals gave added depth and texture to songs that sounded a bit flat otherwise. As much as I like Gary Louris, he can become too soft on the softer numbers to leave much of an impact.

The majority of the album finds the right balance between the band's laid-back style and having just enough energy to keep things from falling apart. I could certainly use a bit more of Louris' trademark fuzz guitar adding details to the acoustic picking, but I also understand that's not the kind of record they were trying to make. This is a somber record for a somber time, and I do appreciate that.

Now this is a personal nit to pick, but I'm not the biggest fan of 'story songs', which leaves me rather confused by "Mr. Lincoln". I don't know what to make of a perfectly nice song that tells the story of Lincoln's funeral train passing through the countryside. It isn't... timely, let's say.

That leaves the album sitting firmly in the middle of The Jayhawks' history. It can't compete with "Hollywood Town Hall" or "Rainy Day Music", or even the underrated reunion of "Mockingbird Time". It does best their less successful experiments like "Paging Mr. Proust" or "Xoxo, so it winds up both satisfying and disappointing at the same time. It's a perfectly pleasant Jayhawks album that does enough to make me happy while I'm listening to it, but it doesn't do enough to convince me it will be essential the way my favorite Jayhawks albums are.