Richmond Fontaine - You Can't Go Back If There's Nothing to Go Back To (2016)

Wow, that was quick, you don't mess around! And that actually isn't a bad price considering it originally sold for about $32 before going out of print (which is probably why I skipped it a couple years ago, I was just too cheap at the time to pay that much, now I'm a little wiser). In any case, it will be going for hundreds after we convince more vinyl fans what a great record it is

I also included it recently in my goto albums from the 2000s, along with 15 other cool records I love ... Introduce 10 of your post 2000 'go-to' albums »

 

I waited on this one for awhile since there's a bunch of brilliant stuff coming out at the moment.

Phew - this is a good 'un. I was a bit let down by their last one, but prior to that they'd been having an extraordainary run - I rate Post To Wire (2004) as one of the finest records of the last 20-odd years.

 

High rotation all day, this one. It's really soaking in now. Supurb record - "A Night In The City" is just staggering.

I really need to get around to checking out The Delines.

 

One of our fellow Forum members recommended The Delines to me earlier this year and, having since bought both Colfax and Scenic Sessions, I can highly recommend them (as a big RF fan). Amy Boone has an amazing voice and is perfectly suited to the lyrics Willy writes for The Delines.

 

Just got hold of this off their Bandcamp page - it's gorgeous. Akin to Dusty Springfield singing Raymond Carver stories backed by a lost Muscle Shoals ensemble - the sort of stuff to make someone like me lose my bearings completely. That voice is pure honey.

 

Enjoy your listening. Colfax is a spectacular debut and I can't wait to hear new music from them which hopefully we'll have next year.

 

Mentioned earlier in this thread and elsewhere, but if you love that sound, definitely keep an eye for the Colfax debut on vinyl from Decor in the UK. Probably won't be around much longer, a bit expensive but sounds great (the digital sounds very nice too), pretty much just as you describe (and check the blurb below from Decor for confirmation, they drag Dusty through a few more of my favorite places ) ...

The debut album from The Delines, Colfax is a timeless collection of songs with the intimacy of a midnight confessional. Like a beat-up Dusty Springfield after too many long nights working a dreary after-hours bar, Colfax has the skid row heart of Tom Waits, the street-tough weariness of early Rickie Lee Jones, and the cool, laid back sound of Mazzy Star.


Listening right now to the great new Insect Courage EP from Califone, really love these guys, though this is mostly just Tim Rutili I think. Anyway, 45rpm 10" vinyl, nice package, pretty much hand-made at Future Oaks, labor of love, bit pricey for just 6 songs, $15 plus shipping, but I forget about that part pretty quickly when the music starts. "Easter82" is a standout of the new songs, also a very cool cover of Peter Gabriel's "Mother of Violence", can't find any clips to post, but may be some previews around... there's some more info at the end of the Califone thread here ... Califone Roomsound on vinyl »

 

I feel a bit the same about Lambchop who have always been very popular in Europe.

 

Thanks - yes, I'll definitely look into that. It's such a fine record - beautifully produced, sound particularly good in the car at night .

re: Califone - I've always admired them from a distance. It's probably high time I sunk my teeth in.

 

Back to Richmond Fontaine, this one goes right up there with Post To Wire - just a stunning set of songs. What an incredible way to clock off. I'll certainly miss them, but here hoping for more future projects from The Delines.

"I Got Off The Bus", "Whitey and Me", "The Blind Horse" and the breathtakingly epic "A Night In The City" are my current favourites.

 

I agree. It can almost be considered a quintessential RF album. A great way to finish their career (and at least we've still got more music from The Delines to look forward to).

I'm looking forward to having one last chance to see them live in London in October.

 

Love The Delines and pretty much anything Willy Vlautin has put out, including his novels. I thought Willy had mentioned in an interview that he originally wanted to form a band with Deborah Kelly but she couldn't because of family/children reasons so instead he got her sister Amy Boone. Deborah has sung on some RF songs and also had a nice little band with Amy called The Damnations TX. Highly recommend their album "Half Mad Moon." Not much on youtube but this will give you a taste of what they sound like.

 

I like this new album but I don't think it will ever be my favorite RF album. If I had to rank their discography right now it would look like this:

1. Thirteen Cities
2. We Used to Think The Freeway Sounded Like A river
3. Winnemucca
4. Obliteration By Time
5. The Fitzgerald
6. Post to Wire
7. You Can't Go Back if There's Nothing to Go Back To
8. Lost Son
9. The High Country
10. Miles From
11. Safety

I love the reworked songs of Safety and Miles From that became the Obliteration album.

So, where would you rank You Can't Go Back...?

 

Interesting question, I'm usually not one that ranks discographies much around here (though I recall recently taking a stab at it with Richard Buckner in one of those rating threads), partly because I'm not much of a completist, even with my favorite artists, so don't have many full discographies, and partly because I just don't usually think of the records in that way. I do have most of the RF albums, but haven't heard their first two, Lost Son from 1999 is the first one I have, and I only recently picked it up via the 2004 remaster so haven't really absorbed it all yet. My one big missing piece right now is Winnemucca, I've heard some of the songs and love what I've heard, and been meaning to pick it up for a long while, but always get distracted by something else that I think I need more. However, with all those provisos out of the way, I'll give it a try ...

Can't disagree with number 1, one of the best records of the 2000s, and that's just an arbitrary starting point, could pick any decade and it would still be one of the best. Brilliant writing throughout, and it's their most consistently great record. There's really not much to compare it against in modern times, for me it's right up there with other modern favorites like Richard Buckner's Devotion + Doubt and Nina Nastasia's The Blackened Air, albums that defy the time of their creation and live amongst the classics. So Thirteen Cities will obviously be my number 1.

But the one I listen to most often, and tell people about again and again, is Post To Wire. It was my introduction to the band, and the record that made me such a huge fan. I just did a search here and looks like I have over 40 posts that mention it, which is kind of embarrassing on the one hand, but also shows how much it means to me. So Post To Wire will be my number 2.

And maybe it's just because it's new, or because it's their last record, or who knows, but at this point in time I would place You Can't Go Back if There's Nothing to Go Back To at number 3. I don't know how long it will stay there, or whether I'll continue to listen to it as the years go by, but it's a very solid record, and some of the songs are among their best, musically and lyrically.

After that it gets kind of murky for me, and I'd have to do a long listening session to come up with meaningful rankings (if there is such a thing), but We Used to Think The Freeway Sounded Like A River would be near the top of what's left. I like some of songs on Obliteration By Time a lot, some of their best rock, but don't think of it quite the same as their other post-Lost Son records. I agree that it's great to hear those songs brought forward, though, I'm glad they put it together, and I need to spend more time with it. Guess I like The High Country a little more than you, but it did wear out fast and I haven't listened in quite a while. And I can foresee a revisting of The Fitzgerald in my near future, I used to think very highly of it (and I even have some hyperbolic blathering in the archives here to show it ... Best Releases of 2005 (New Material) so far »), but then Thirteen Cities came along a couple years later and completely overshadowed it in my mind, and I just haven't listened to it recently.

Anyway, enough of that, hopefully some others will chime in with some more complete rankings. Have you heard the Live Farndale, UK (11th Sept 2009) set? It's not an official release, but should be, it's a great live recording, and sanctioned by the band and the The Band Room club owner. The tour was supporting Freeway, so you get a few of those songs, and they sound great in this setting. I just love it. The person who did the recording has a torrent available, it's an amazing recording, captures a lot of space, really puts you there. Very highly recommended, and they're such a hot band live, the music and the banter, the interplay with the small audience, it's just all good ....
bt.etree.org | Community Tracker - Details for torrent "Richmond Fontaine - 11th September 2009" »

 

I posted some of an interview at The Quietus with Willy after Colfax came out, and it was a little different from that, but who knows, just glad it happened the way it did ... I only have a few albums from this year, need recommendations!! »

 

Made a machine by describing the landscape ...

 

Thanks - I'll check it out!

 

Ok, that story makes sense. Also I dig the Califone song you posted and would love to listen to that RF concert but for the life of me can't figure out how to download/play it. A little Help?

 

Yea, Califone is pretty great, Roomsound and Quicksand/Cradlesnakes especially. The one I posted is from the latter, but just love that opening line, made a machine by describing the landscape, it also was used as the title of a pretty cool Califone tour film a few years back.

The link I posted is to a description page for a torrent, and there is a link on it to download the torrent, so you would need to have a client installed, like BitTorrent. But I just checked and no one is seeding it anymore so it won't work anyway. I could, but I'd have to change a lot of file names and stuff to get it back to the original. Maybe I can just copy it someplace for you to download normally. I'll PM you later, they are flac files, so you can use any player that supports flac, or convert to other format.

 

BTW, since we were just talking about the great Thirteen Cities, thought some of you Richmond Fontaine vinyl fans may be excited to hear that Decor is issuing it for the first time on vinyl as a 2-LP set, which has been expanded with some of the songs from the $87 EP, including the great tribute to Mia Zapata of The Gits, as below ... this looks like a beauty, preorder is up now for Oct 7 release, and they are doing The Fitzgerald as a single LP too...

Ltd edition Double LP tracklisting
A1.Intro/The Border
A2.Moving Back Home #2
A3.$87 And A Guilty Conscience That Gets Worse The Longer I Go
A4. I Fell Into Painting Houses In Phoenix, Arizona
A5.El Tiradito
A6.WIlson Dunlap
B1.A Ghost I Became
B2.Westward Ho
B3 The Gits
B4 Moving Back Home #1
B5$43.50
B6 St Ides, Parked Cars, And Other People's Homes
C1.The Kid From Belmont Street
C2..Capsized
C3.Ballad of Dan Fanta
C4.Song For James Welch
D1.Water Wars
D2.The Disappearance of Ray Norton
D3.Four Walls
D4.Lost In This World

 

Really excellent - I'm in. That's my week sorted I think.

As for this new one by Richmond Fontaine, the love affair continues - an ideal companion in the car for a couple of drives last weekend through the southern vales amidst this abysmal Hobart-esque winter. Melanie De Blasio's have also be appropriate accompaniments in that regard too.

 

I might set up a playlist with the ep and album using this running order and see how it sounds.

I agree, Thirteen Cities is definitely close to the highpoint of RF's output.

 

Regarding Winnemucca, the new vinyl edition has a bonus track called El Rancho that is actually the original version of The Janitor from The Fitzgerald. If you're interested in a backstory on the album and the song here is a link to "The Story of the Making of Winnemucca" from RF's website:
winnemucca » Richmond Fontaine »

and the song El Rancho

 

Love this one, such a great album, my favorite by far

 

Excerpt from an interview with Willy last month...

J. What projects are you working on now? Writing? Your band, The Delines?

W.V. The Delines have a new record but we are on hold until (singer) Amy Boone (recently injured in a car accident) gets rolling again. Other than that I’m finishing a new novel that will come out in about a year.