Review: Joe Fletcher & The Wrong Reasons - "White Lighter"

Providence's Joe Fletcher & The Wrong Reasons released the excellent White Lighter in December of last year.  We previewed the album a couple months prior to that - but I feel like the release got a bit lost in the shuffle of a west coast trip, compiling year end lists and fighting through hoards of holiday shoppers.  While I may be a few months late, I feel like I need to go on record giving White Lighter its due.

My experience with White Lighter started sometime in the summer/fall of last year when, on a recommendation from my good friends at Kitchen Sessions, I contributed to the Kickstarter campaign to fund the album.  I hadn't heard a note, but their gushing told me all I needed to know to fork over my $10-15.  That was money very well-spent. 

The urban legend of the white lighter is well-documented - but the decision to name the album after a mythical curse might give you a hint as to the contents that lie within.  These are not happy songs.  They are songs of bad luck, bad decisions, hard living, harder drinking, desperation and loss.  And isn't that exactly what you expect out of a hard-edged, whiskey-soaked country album.

The album starts on a somewhat upbeat note with the folky "Say What You Will", but takes a sharp turn towards outlaw-country territory on "Ambulances".  Above a shuffling beat Joe Fletcher's perfectly-deep, gravelly voice growls "Just yesterday I was the queen of ballroom dance, now it's motor courts, heroin and ambulances" as a boxcar harmonica wails in the background.  Shit.  "Flat Tire" is the perfect song to soundtrack some Hollywood scene where the heartbroken lover roars down the desert highway, bottle in hand as he starts to wonder how it all went wrong.  "Every Heartbroken Man" is a slow-burner and (in my opinion) the absolute centerpiece of the album - a devestating story song that proves Fletcher's mettle as a songwriter, and the band's prowess.  One hopes that Joe Fletcher hasn't lived the life he describes in these songs - but they're delivered with such intensity, passion and weary resignation that you can't help but believe these are his stories.

The album certainly features the gritty influence of Merle Haggard and Johnny Cash, but there are lighter moments to provide a necessary balance - the swinging "Drunk and Single (For George Jones)" provides witty levity - "Some talk funny and some can't walk and others fall down on the floor/But when the beers are cold my fidelity's the first to go".  Woozy singalong "Too Many Doors" closes the album with contributions from a Providence folk all-star team of John McCauley (Deer Tick), David Lamb and MorganEve Swain of Brown Bird.  It's a gorgeous song and an unexpectedly uplifting end to a masterful and rewarding album.

Joe Fletcher & The Wrong Reasons - Say What You Will

BIG update!  Forgot to mention that you can get White Lighter FREE for a limited time here.

Joe Fletcher & The Wrong Reasons have a bunch of local dates coming up, including THIS SATURDAY at the Middle East with Kingsley Flood and The Grownup Noise (CD Release):

3/26 - Cambridge, MA @ Middle East (Downstairs) w/ Kingsley Flood, Grownup Noise
3/29 - Providence, RI @ Firehouse 13 w/ Those Darlins (CD Release Party), Atlantic Thrills
4/1- Providence, RI @ The 201 TOM WAITS TRIBUTE/ Amos House Fundraiser
4/3- Providence, RI @ Club Hell w/ Eddie Spaghetti
4/9- Groton, CT @ Backstage Rose's Cantina w/ Get Haunted, Paul Brockett Roadshow

WHITE LIGHTER SPRING TOUR
Fri 4/15 Providence, RI @ The 201*
Sat 4/16 Housatonic, MA @ The Brick House Pub*
Sun 4/17 Charleston, WV @ The Empty Glass*
Mon 4/18 Knoxville, TN @ The Preservation Pub*
Tue 4/19 (noon) Blue Plate Special on WDVX in Knoxville*
Wed 4/20 Nashville, TN @ fooBar*
Thu 4/21 Columbus, OH @ Rhumba Cafe*
Fri 4/22 Brooklyn, NY @ Pete's Candy Store*
Sat 4/23 Cambridge, MA @ The Plough & Stars*

* with Lydia Loveless

Video of "Say What You Will" from Kitchen Sessions: