Chris Statpleton’s Higher sees the Kentucky-born country singer relying on familiar sonic and lyrical tropes: big guitars, ragged vocals, and lyrical themes of love, weariness, and tattered masculinity. But while Stapleton’s voice is as expressive as ever throughout his fifth studio album, the songwriting is safe and, at times, almost anonymous.
Higher opens with “What Am I Gonna Do,” which is loaded with jam-inspired guitar breaks and a loose, spontaneous-feeling groove. The track serves as a sort of template for many of the songs that follow—mostly midtempo country-rockers that are either expressions of tenderness and devotion to a lover or forlorn ruminations on a former one. While tracks like “South Dakota,” “The Bottom,” and “Crosswind” are all competently performed and produced, the music itself feels like a dime-store imitation of Eric Church or even the Allman Brothers Band.
“White Horse” is the best of the album’s uptempo cuts, and largely due to its relative lyrical subtlety. While most of the other songs on Higher are lyrically vague and repetitive in their fixation on the trials of broken, lonely men and the women in their lives, “White Horse” ironically seems to suggest a critique of such narratives: “If you want a cowboy on a white horse/Riding off into the sunset…Hold on tight girl, I ain’t there yet.”
The album’s ballads are ultimately more rewarding for their sonic and lyrical variety, allowing room for Stapleton’s agile voice to shine. Tracks like “Think I’m In Love with You” and “Loving You on My Mind” are just as indebted to Sade or Al Green as they are to Drive-By Truckers, with Stapleton’s vocal cracks on the latter evoking any number of soul songs from the 1960s. His voice moves effortlessly between a raspy whisper to a desperate yelp on “It Takes a Woman,” a performance that’s complemented by his wife Morgan Stapleton’s harmonies.
Elsewhere, the breezy “The Fire” provides a respite from the album’s harder rock tracks and the somber ballads. Stapleton knows that his vocals don’t need to be forceful to make an impact, a point driven home on the beautiful closer “Mountains of My Mind,” on which his intimate voice is paired with just an acoustic guitar. But while tracks like that are evidence of Stapleton’s singing and storytelling abilities, more often than not, the songs on Higher struggle to take off.
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Whatever dude.