It's an eerie, nocturnal scene. What looks like a disused industrial unit is lit by security lighting; a high mesh wire surrounds the compound and on the empty road outside an anonymous carrier bag sits unassumingly away from the glare. So, what's in the bag, then? An explosive device? Money? Porn mags? Tins of peaches? Should we fear what's inside this strangely housed sleeve?
No, because it's just the usual round of superbly crafted, slightly country-influenced power pop songs from America's greatest nearly man and consistently brilliant songwriter, MARSHALL CRENSHAW, actually. And it'll rank as perhaps his best collection until his next lovingly created set rolls around.
Crenshaw's never really been within hailing distance of the supposed 'zeitgeist', but to continue to avoiding his back catalogue is your problem alone. "What's In The Bag?" shows - again - how refreshing the much misused term "singer/ songwriter" can still be in the right hands.
As ever, most of the gear here is memorable of tune, catchy of chorus and sounds entirely natural. Songs like the lovely "The Spell Is Broken" and "Long And Complicated" recall Richard Thompson, benefit from the supple contributions from upright bassist Tony Scherr and swing beautifully; the lazy spangle of "A Few Thousand Days Ago" could give Neil Finn a run for his money and even the potentially incongruous cover of Prince's "Take Me With U" gets recast in a recognisably Crenshaw image. And it rocks into the bargain.
Elsewhere, Marshall writes superbly about the heart's vicissitudes and calls in a number of well-connected friends to realise his ideas. The regretful "Where Home Used To Be" features Joe Jackson bassist Graham Maby, Jane Scarpantoni's gorgeous, melody-infusing cello and mellotron from the man himself; the first flush of love blues "Alone In A Room" is benefits from deliciously lazy guitar riffing and the sparse, jazzy vibraphone and finds Crenshaw peeling off a fabulous, Robert Quine-style guitar break, while he comes over all Mark Eitzel on the waltz-time opener "Will We Ever?": a wonderfully worn-down paean to existence on the road which opens with the great lines: "There's nothing on the radio, another hundred miles to go, through the fog and rain and wind, will we ever love again?"
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There's a smidgen of dead wood. Likeable though they are, both the instrumentals "Despite The Sun" and the closing "AKA (A Big Heavy Hot Dog)" meander too much and "I'd Rather Be With You" is too overwrought and definitely doesn't merit its' reprise. But these are only minor blots on the landscape and "What's In The Bag?" also features perhaps the ultimate in success-avoidance self-deprecation with "From Now Until Then",where Marshall sings all sorts of rueful stuff like: "I took a big chance on a sure thing...it wasn't to be", before loading up a glorious sunrise of a chorus and Andy York supplies a whipsmart guitar solo. Despite stiff competition, it's quite probably the very best thing here.
It's entirely typical of Crenshaw's career that his biggest hit record is actually a cover of his song "You're My Favourite Waste Of Time" (by Owen Paul back in the mists of 1986), but that shouldn't stop you digging into the many delights of his weighty, 20-year plus back catalogue. There's more hidden treasure than you could imagine and "What's In The Bag?" is a contender for one of the brightest sparklers of all lurking in there.
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