Jeffrey Foucault’s songs are well worn, like your favorite boots, caked with dirt and dust, weathered by years of abuse and traveling long and winding roads. Those songs are the best kinds of songs. The ones with deeper meanings, with stories told over tired post-show load outs or late night drives. The kinds of things that only a certain breed of people see and experience. The stuff that seeps into the cracks of old wooden barroom floorboards and only peeks its head out in the nighttime.

There are bluesy tinges that mark  and stain the corners of the songs contained on Salt As Wolves. Foucault laments about people and places he has seen over blues transitions that are rough around the edges in the very best way. Letting the human element of his stories truly shine through beautifully. A dark bar with a few of the regulars there to wet their palettes, perhaps unaware of the genius that is unfolded through an old PA in the corner.

‘You Are A Fool’ is a slow burning waltz. A delicate dance about a delicate love and how it may be hard to give up regardless of circumstance. It just hovers there and you can’t turn around. Surrounded by a cloak of the wisps of smokiness that Foucault’s voice sings out in.

‘Rico’ is perhaps my favorite of the bunch, which is saying a lot for the track. It has a dirty entry point, gritty and soulful, unapologetic. “I barely knew him / he was your good friend / and I think about him, every now and then / how all the real ones die with nothing / half of the time”. A song about a familiar character we all have meet in dark lit rooms An infectious groove that stays with you long after listening.

RICO – LIVE UIT LLOYD – ROTTERDAM NL from Jeffrey Foucault on Vimeo.

The singer-songwriter is an authority when it comes to purposing his voice best for the mood of each moment of a particular song. Commanding when it needs to be and relaxed, purposeful and tentative, reluctant to create tension at times. Whether he is singing out strong or simply chanting out a repeated phrase calmly it is powerful in how he delivers each and every word.

While it came to me a bit late in the year, I will proclaim now that this record is landing in my top 3 for 2015. It checks every box and hits every target. Intelligent, pensive, and haunting. This collection is song after song of sincere but tough stories, portraits of genuine people, interesting landscapes, and an invitation to experience it if you just let it in, brilliant and real.

Salt As Wolves is out on October 16th and you can still pre-order it here: http://www.pledgemusic.com/projects/jeffreyfoucault and if you feel like doing yourself a favor, you’ll do that right now.