Which leads to Lamentations, spearheaded by Shooter Jennings and reportedly about Barham’s view of modern southern culture. It’s not quite the complete band reformation that happened ahead of 2018’s Things Change, but it was another loss Barham eventually recovered from and turned into a positive. Trouble found the band ahead of their newest album, too, when their scheduled record producer decided he and the band wouldn’t work well together. With Barham, though, that darkness comes with a rare persistence, enough to where the American Aquarium of today is much different than the one just mere years ago. Which, yes, means that calling front man BJ Barham a relentless sad sack has become something of a cliché over the years – not unlike the one that follows performers like John Moreland and Gretchen Peters around. It’s telling that, in the midst of record labels requesting happy music and mainstream country music shelling out one mindless, nihilistic drinking song after another to try and cheer up audiences, American Aquarium have decided to press on with their latest album release – and offer hope with something much more profound. And though 2018’s Things Change signaled an overall bigger change for the band, Lamentations is another reinvention in and of itself, resulting in the band’s best album yet – and one of the best albums of the year. Lamentations is both another insight into BJ Barham’s mind and past and a way to offer confidence for the future, even if it’s a bleak listen to get there.
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January 2023
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