Review: Lord Huron – ‘Strange Trails’


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2015 may still be in its infancy, but musically an apex may have reached. ‘Strange Trails‘ is a majestic and intoxicating album, equally as haunting and yearning as it is beautiful and warm.

This is impressive considering just how good their debut, ‘Lonesome Dreams‘, was. Yet, it knocks the achievements of that record out of the park. Lord Huron’s Ben Schneider delivers a set of songs that is intoxicating, it is a record full to the very brim with verve and intent.

Sounding almost like the very essence of Americana, without ever being contrived or kitsch, this is a truly mesmerising album that manages to take the listener on a guided tour of America, incorporating everything that makes the nation and its self-mythologising approach to music so wonderful. Selling an America that feels so real, one that everyone understands, but one that has probably never existed, it is quite literally the stuff of dreams.

‘Strange Trails’ in many ways feels almost like a companion piece to Vikesh Kapoor’s sublime debut, ‘The Ballad of Willy Robbins‘. But where Kapoor spoke about the harsh and bitter realities of the modern America, this album sells the dream of what it still could and should be, steeped in romance and mystery.

And there is so much more here besides. Schneider mixes everything from Tom Petty to Bruce Springsteen, The Beach Boys to Bob Dylan, My Morning Jacket to Portugal. The Man, or even Iron & Wine to Smog and more besides. Covering rock, rockabilly, country and alt-country, and anything else Schneider had to hand, it’s the sound of the mountains and the sound of the sea fused into one. An impossible vision, made real by a very single minded vision.

Opener ‘Love Like Ghosts‘ encapsulates the beauty of My Morning Jacket into a beautiful tale of loss, while ‘Meet Me In The Woods‘ has the brilliant thumping chug of Springsteen at his most potent. Although, it’s also about Lord Huron themselves, with tracks like the amazingly beautiful and dreamlike ‘La Belle Fleur Sauvage‘ and powerful ‘Cursed‘ bringing their own vision to these tales.

The standout moment is ‘The World Ender‘, which has the wonderful melancholy shimmer and power of Chris Isaac’s ‘You Owe Me Some Kind Of Love‘ and ‘Lie To Me‘, only on a far grander scale.

Regardless of topic or influence, one thing Schneider has brought to the record is a wonderful sunny pop shimmer, like a country and western equivalent to The Beach Boys, singing songs about the wilderness. It’s as if Brian Wilson got good and lost, some kind of schizophrenic Californian surf Jesus wandering in the desert. There is a warmth and glow to the entire record that cannot be ignored. And, this warm glow is probably what gives the record its hazy, dreamlike beauty.

Throughout, ‘Strange Trails’ has a truly mesmerising grandeur and majesty, and stuns from beginning to end. Lord Huron have created something powerful and beautiful, an album that tells its story on its own terms, without compromise. These are tales of what could and should have been, and will haunt us all to the end.



But what a beautiful and welcoming end it will be – so here’s to the end!

(Dylan Llewellyn-Nunes)


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3 Comments

  1. Ben 4 April, 2015
  2. Yup 6 April, 2015
  3. Wyo Mike 8 April, 2015