Daniel Romano - Mosey [2LP Ice Black]

Mosey hasn't been released since 2016, and it returns on Black Ice vinyl cut to 45 rpm, which is the appropriate treatment for the strangest album Daniel Romano has ever made.

Romano never stayed put long enough for anyone to properly categorize him, and with his fifth album, he simply invented a genre to contain everything he did: Mosey Music. This caught people off guard at the time. He'd built an audience on beautifully crafted classic country music, and this album took a sharp turn, shattering genres and bending rules with the confidence of someone who'd stopped asking permission. Imagine Dylan in his Rolling Thunder days in a room with Lee Hazlewood, Tom Waits and Peter Green, all chatting amicably, and you're somewhere close.

Valerie Leon opens with saturated electric waves and brass pushing from the edges, and Romano delivers it with a theatrical fury that never veers into parody. Toulouse brings in Rachel McAdams as a guest vocalist for the album's most unexpected moment of tenderness, Hunger Is a Dream You Die In lives up to such a good title, and Dead Medium closes the album somewhere between a lament and a joke.

Twelve tracks on two 45 rpm discs, finally available again for all those who missed them.