Lost Dog Street Band: Glory
Photo by Melissa Payne
I believe that every piece of art is made for an audience. Sometimes the creator is painfully aware of the audience, sometimes the creator is oblivious to the audience. Truly introspective artists that dig beyond the surface through the comfortable, to the parts of ourselves that we only visit when we’re alone, are rare. These artists have a unique, stressful, and tenuous relationship with their audiences, because while they intend to relay an experience, a perspective, or an idea, they give pieces of themselves that are difficult to recoup. In the case of Glory, by the venerable Lost Dog Street Band, it reads as a warning at times to their audience, with the next breath a roadmap, and the next a story of redemption, change, growth.
Glory is a proud and focused album that shows once you deconstruct the walls between you and what distances you from the love that surrounds you, you’re left with bricks and debris. When you take inventory of these, you have a choice: try to dispose of them, hide them, tidy them and put them away, or use them to build a foundation that allows you to live your life from a fresh and healthy place, what Benjamin Tod describes as “a logical glimpse of climbing out of hell.”
Much to the chagrin of many people learning to live with sobriety, this album tells the tale of learning that getting clean is barely starting the journey. Sobriety is the beginning of a difficult journey of battling the demons that chase you; that you’ve allowed to become friends and family along the way. So many people believe it’s the end of the darkness, that it is the door opening to the light. On this deeply personal record, it’s revealed that instead, once you remove the shade of substance, you have no choice but to confront the things that you’ve packed away in the attic of your mind, and you’re left without the comforts of a place to hide. But the album balances that with the rewards of the work, and the reaping of the comfort and care you sow. As Benjamin Tod describes it: “It’s like a punch in the face and a kiss on the cheek every day.”
Glory is an album that is as clear and focused in sound as it is in lyric and theme. Removing the elements of past Lost Dog Street Band records that may have felt like they were crowding the space of recordings feels simultaneously more intimate and powerful. It allows the instrumentalists on the record to shine in ways not heard on previous records. Every member of the recording was a busking musician, which Benjamin describes as "important to me, just getting back to the root of things.”
The descriptions of the pitfalls of addiction are nowhere more plainly described than on the powerful and painful “Cost of the High,” describing the effects of the grips of addiction as it relates to the things you trade and lose in pursuit of a temporary release and relief. The darkness that comes with the comfort and pain of drugs is eloquently expressed in a song that views a phrase from multiple angles, “What Keeps Me Up Now,” which turns the phrase from a sleepless night, to a suicide attempt. The album rarely lets up, and continues to push deeper to the point of extreme discomfort, and that’s where you find the beauty. This process of discovery and digging is described in “Beautiful Curse.”
The rare and beautiful light that shines on the record is no better described than the track “End With You.” The song describes a partnership that a decade past started the band and now holds itself up as a picture of integrity in a business that is often sly, ethically sparse and more show than substance. That partnership is as graceful as the soulful harmonies and as deep as the bass that populates these intentionally sparsely-populated compositions, and is the same partnership that was threatened by the stress of addiction that litters this record. This song celebrates a decade that kept Benjamin Tod on a track that led to this record. The artistic and personal relationship of Benjamin and Ashley Mae started as a true street band busking for a hard living.
This album is pulling the curtain back to tell the truth, against any instinct that may be there to do otherwise. This version of the hero’s journey is less about slaying the dragon and riding into the sunset, and instead about the doubts and fears of the hero along the way. It tells of an imperfect man, handling a less than perfect set of circumstances in a challenging world. Luckily it’s the start of the journey, not the end.
If you’ve followed the journey of Lost Dog Street Band, this album is for you. If you love composition that relies on intimacy and acoustic arrangement, this album is for you. If you’re a fan of lyricism that goes beyond the surface into the depths that challenge you, this album is for you. If you’re recovering and looking for a real example of the struggles that come from that, not a rosy-lensed jubilee, this album is for you. If you’re a fan of intentional storytelling and great musicianship, this album is for you.
Glory lands on January 21st and deserves a listen, honestly to catch the nuance and complexity, it deserves a handful of listens. Give it your full attention and it will reward you in return with storytelling and musical richness that’s raw and real in a very rare way.
Find out more about Lost Dog Street Band here: