The Delines

• Colfax [El Cortez, 2014] ***
• The Imperial [Decor/El Cortez, 2019] A-

Consumer Guide Reviews:

Colfax [El Cortez, 2014]
Always aiming sweet and never straying saccharine, natural-born Willy Vlautin heroine Amy Boone sings her continuing pain and occasional solace ("Calling In," "Colfax Avenue," "Wichita Ain't So Far Away") ***

The Imperial [Decor/El Cortez, 2019]
As is clearer in the novels he's said are more "easygoing" than his music--particularly Lean On Pete, the movie version of which earned raves last year--Willy Vlautin's songs aren't dark because he thinks dark is cool or mistakes his own depressive tendencies for existential truth. Instead, the forlorn, mumbly affect of his signature band, Richmond Fontaine, is attributable more to his vocal limitations than to his philosophy of life. That's why he recruited Amy Boone to front the Delines. In both bands Vlautin finds pathos and dignity in sub-working class stragglers who drink too much and fall out of love when the money's gone. But Boone sings so thoughtful and caring that you feel the strength as well as the pain of the wronged women whose stories Vlautin has her tell--the escapee from Felony Flats and the lover fixing to buy her guy a new coat from Arlene's as well as Holly the Hustle stuck with a handicapper twice her age and Polly giving it one more try a day after Eddie busted her in the face. Deepest of all is the lead "Cheer Up Charley," which doesn't mean Charley should go get stoned. It means that if he uses up all his vacation days he'll lose that "job on the docks" he'll never beat, and then what? "There ain't no end to going down / There ain't no end / So cheer up Charley." A-