- After reuniting with his long-time stablemates Alexisonfire for a handful of tantalising festival dates & some new music from that entity, Dallas Green is donning the City & Colour moniker once again. Since the man-and-his-guitar era of City & Colour, the twin peaks of Green’s musical muscles have been the mournful tenderness ever-present in that angelic falsetto and the trained eye he has for picking at and unravelling his listener's emotional stitching. Each album in the Canadian’s canon has patiently and sequentially raised its level of gravitas. Bigger soundscapes and a grander sonic framework have graduated from singer-songwriter territory into a full band with triumph. A Pill For Loneliness fills the void of connection noted in its own title with tastefully turgid arrangements that ebb and flow with the album’s beating, albeit battered, heart.
The booming drums ushering in Living In Lightning have their hefty weight almost immediately betrayed by weightless, floating melodies. As the song progresses, the steady single chord strum on an acoustic guitar locks into step with the drums and remains to form the skeleton. A crisp, doubled vocal harmony waltzes surely in during the early stages and is brought back into the fray during the chorus. Though ruminating on living in emotional turmoil, it unfurls, larger with each passing bar. The melodic steps that mark the climb to the chorus drop calmly away into a serene sea.
On the back of that unwavering, metronome-basic drum beat, Imagination triggers a toe-tapping. Green’s vocals occupy the focal point here. They’re herded to the forefront of the song by simple sonic shepherds, in a similar vein to what was first heard on lead single Strangers. Put in such a position by effective, straight forward backings, it is a gracious showcase. A blatant commercial accessibility works its way into Difficult Love. It grew on me as a potential crossover single as the song champions an airy motif. This motif is introduced prior to the first verse, transposed through the chorus, and forms the last notes played before the close.
Outside of a spate of eye-rolling lines and an awkwardly placed expletive, Me and The Moonlight, gives a light palette cleanse. Its comparatively light composition and shyness towards production magic mark the rise before the fall into the haunting Mountain of Madness. Taking stylistic cues from some of the more hymn-like songs in the back catalogue, the slow paced grandeur envelops all. It trudges through with a downtrodden tone, licked by near atonal guitar melodies.
Although, for one reason or another, I’d let the previous few releases from City and Colour pass me by without giving it much mind, A Pill For Loneliness is a forceful reminder of why this solo work had me enraptured for so long. With an obvious drawcard being the peerless voice of its main proprietor, City and Colour fills out into the full band mode with ease and applies each extra element to great effect. Strip it all back to the simplest of components and these songs would still be as captivating as they are with all the bells and whistles. Given that, you have nothing to do but bask in the glory.
- Matt Lynch.