Ben Rogers is a folk singer songwriter from Vancouver, although, you'd be hard pressed to spot that from listening to 'Lost Stories Volume 1', which appear to have sprung straight out of the dusty well worn roads of the Southern States of the US.
Ben's unique brand of folk/Americana/country in some ways belongs to a different age, however his lyrics are very much in the moment and razor sharp.
The album upon which Ben sings and plays all instruments was recorded in Vancouver and Los Angeles and was released in the US last year, since that time, Ben has been touring in support of this. There are ten tracks on the album, with some excellent storytelling.
Opening with 'The Dealer', a country folk song with some excellent mournful harmonica, this is one where the lyrics hit hard. A story of a man never given a chance in his childhood, sucked into a web of drug abuse, dealing and degradation: -
“I was born in Carolina, Raised with a heavy hand/ My mother was a-pushing up daisies, My father was a drinking man/ The one night my beating never came. I learned why when I found him in the hall
All five years of his education splattered on the wall...”
After a start like this, there isn't much hope for the character in this story: - “Then all it took was one taste of my poison, and that was it/ And I wound up like some bloodthirsty spider tangled up in its own web/ Oh, temptation never fails, but it only lets you down/ And addiction has you decomposing, long before you’re in the ground.”
Other tracks on the album that also pack a strong punch are 'The Cheatin' Kind', and with a title like that, you know you're in for a ride on the emotions of a man who has been wronged. With acoustic guitar and harmonica to the fore, this reminded me of some of Bob Dylan's early work, however unlike Dylan, Ben's lyrics are very direct: - “She don’t bother leaving out the back door no more. She got nothing to hide, nothing to lose/ She come home with cologne all over her, and she smells more like a man than I do/ I been lying here like a colicing horse, a .45 rifle is a poor man’s divorce/ It’s the only way to ease your mind of the cheatin’ kind...Lord, the cheatin’ kind.”
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'Cowboys and Indians' is a wonderful folk song that through excellent storytelling, manages to challenge racism, when the daughter of a cowboy falls for an Indian boy: - “When the daughter she returned back home, she found the cowboy waiting all alone/ He was standing out by the laundry line. He said, “You know not to mix the reds with the whites/ And the same goes for you, no daughter of mine Will be caught dead mixing with his kind”/ He said, “I never should have trusted that Indian scum”. And he took to the fields carrying his gun.”
Once again, you know that this is a tale that won't end well, however it turns full circle, when the narrator realises that his mother was the girl in the story, and he was the offspring of a mixed relationship.
Overall, this is an excellent album, and if this is Volume 1, then I can't wait for Volume 2!
Listen to Ben Rogers at Bandcamp
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