Terrence & the Straight Shooters

Buy on Bandcamp: https://terrence2.bandcamp.com/album/all-my-disgraces

Stream on your preferred streaming service: https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/terrenceandthestraightshooters/all-my-disgraces

Terrence & the Straight Shooters’ latest release, All My Disgraces, suggests the emotional power gained through suffering. Whatever these disgraces might be—mostly heartbreak and doomed relationships, with a dash of some very appealing-sounding drug abuse—you’re glad Terrence has suffered through them. His characteristically witty lyrics are enhanced by his most emotionally resonant delivery to date.

Personal history and musical history collide: a versatile retro band, assembled and lovingly recorded by obvious devotees of such classic styles as Motown, R&B, and country-rock, transports the songs across the landscape of American musical vernacular. Double-stop country licks and pedal steel guitar, hand claps and backup sha-la-las, talk-singing and lush organ swells, all form a rich, organic Americana musical backdrop. So many independent artists stick to one sound and beat it to death over the course of a release, but Terrence lets his knowledge and love of American music saturate the album, which, like a classic American road trip, reveals the durable soul within a varied and surprising outing.

The rich and detailed production matches Terrence’s always impressive lyrics, and benefits his latest arrangements, which on earlier recordings were experimental and searching, but are now confidently unique, embracing of a deeper emotional palette. In a pop music era of wannabe-witty wordplay, lyrics by committee, and rigid syllables conformed to quantized instrumentation, Terrence's creative choices stand out. The catchy and pleasingly nonsensical vocal line in “Ta Hi Ta Hell” is delivered over a heartland rock arrangement with a lacerating lead guitar. The self-deprecating “Over the Weekend” cleverly updates the winking country ballad tradition to take aim at modern dating and working. Terrence puts the vocals and lyrics up front, frequently launching into a song with an attention-getting lyric, such as "All the Time's" “I wanna get high—all the time!”

“All My Disgraces” will remind you over and over again what it’s like for a heartfelt tune to reveal itself naturally. Each song features original stylistic choices, and all are just flat-out more creative than what today’s risk-adverse producers will ever bring to market.

Listening to All My Disgraces from start to finish is like hanging out with the aloof wordsmith late into the night, so that you grasp his contradictions and see what really makes him tick. You’re also sure he’s got one hell of a record collection.

-PH