Album Review: Brett Kissel, The Compass Project

Usually, I don’t think that Brett Kissel is that interesting, and having a four album set (based on the cardinal directions), made me a little nervous. The first album of the series, South Album, pretty much confirmed my doubts–the first track sang about sun dresses, and the last song was an anodyne cover of “Cadillac Ranch”. The second album, East, a haunted and melancholic album, devoid of any of the silly pleasures of his  previous work, is as difficult and as genuinely beautiful as anything he has done. It has convinced me that Kissel has a future that is darker than he has had previously. 

The revision of country canards is key to the album, in the song “Port Colborne”, instead of a song about how sustaining or comforting small towns are, he sings about a woman raising a son, not being able to make the rent, and not finding a partner, in a “dirty little town”, where “the rent goes up/and the sun goes down/in a sad and heartbreak harbour town”. The song is marred by a redemptive third verse, Kissel cannot quite commit to full bleakness, but where he does, the work becomes revelatory. See, especially the nostalgia of “When I Get on a Memory”, with subtle fiddle, and complex harmonies or “Coastline”, which is as fully realized ballad as Kissel is done.

I was neutral on South, genuinely surprised at the skill of East, and intrigued by the possibilities of North and West, out later this year.

The Compass Project: East Album was released March 31, 2023.
Listen to it here.