ISRAEL NASH GRIPKA is the eponymously-titled debut album from the Midwestern singer/ songwriter of the same name who – as the title suggests – has re-located to the ever-fertile Big Apple in more recent times.
Although this writer was piteously ignorant of Gripka's very existence prior to the release of this album, it comes with prestigious names like Ryan Adams and Richard Thompson being dropped in its' wake and – in fairness – they're not all that wide of the mark all things considered.
'New York Town' gets one very important thing right. It opens and closes magnificently. Opening track 'Evening' is arguably the finest thing here. Musically, it proffers a relatively catchy, Roots-rock sound with a rock backdrop getting pepped up with banjo and additional acoustic guitar. Its' strengths are the sombre, confessional edge of the lyrics and Gripka's commanding bark of a voice and it works especially well when you realise he's singing the fatalistic words from the point of view of a ghost looking back on what he's leaving behind. The conclusion (“I took a policy out on my life, well I heard it came in handy one day when I died/ 65 grand should be coming in your name/ well I'm sorry for the pain, but it's easier this way”) is one of the saddest things you'll hear all year, but it's also one of the most resonant and it'll stay with you for ages afterwards.
At the opposite end of the spectrum, the concluding pair of tracks – 'Pink Long-Stem Rose' and 'Beautiful' – are equally devastating. '...Rose' is the most overtly Country-influenced outing here and has all the hallmarks of a classic tear-jerker, with the stateliest of pianos, sighing pedal steel and Gripka's most naked, bourbon-soaked vocal (“you quoted me scriptures, you cleansed me from sin/ I'm sorry I was late for our wedding, I was down at the bar again”) aiding and abetting an emotional release of some repute. Following on from this, 'Beautiful' is an all-too-brief, but exquisitely sad round midnight postscript which can't fail to make mush of what 'Pink Long-Stem Rose' has left of your heart.
All three songs are good enough to ensure Israel Nash Gripka should be marked out as someone to watch very closely indeed over the next few years and while the rest of the songs don't quite hit the same stellar heights, they still conspire to ensure 'New York Town' will be a regular on discerning, Americana-tinged stereos over the next twelve months or so.
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The culture shock of Gripka's new urban existence appears to have rubbed him up the wrong way, but it's fired up his creativity. Emotional outings like 'Let It Go' and the self-explanatory 'Confess' (“when the sun goes down, it's always my heart they can't find”) bear permanent scars of loneliness and resignation, while the scuffed 'You Were Right' (which recalls Ryan Adams' 'Answering Bell') also slow burns its' way to a wailing watershed of a chorus.
Mostly, though, it's simply the universal knocks taken while veering wildly down life's highway which seem to inform Gripka's towering and vulnerable songs. 'Either Way' hits a soulful groove which really suits him, yet it's married to a tale of drinking, emotional turmoil and forgiveness which is all too easy to identify with. Indeed, even when he turns up the heat on expansive rockers like 'Bricks', and the full-on, Springsteen-style anthem 'Pray For Rain', it's the inherent hurt and insecurity in Gripka's delivery that really makes him stand out from the pack.
Yes, it's true that emotionally-battered singer/ songwriters are a thousand deep these days, but as the old saying goes, there's always room for one more if they're of sufficient quality. Israel Nash Gripka has the advantage of coming armed a name you're not liable to forget anyway, but 'New York Town' suggests it's a name you'll be conjuring in years to come.
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