Album Review: Damien Jurado – What's New, Tomboy?

Damien Jurado's fifteenth studio album What's New, Tomboy? sees the singer-songwriter's impeccable lyricism placed at the forefront of his work.

Minimal production and instrumentation allow for the lyrics to be washed in Jurado's warm vocal tones. The album feels intimate, like peering through somebody's window late at night. Vignettes about relationships, commitment, and losing yourself in someone else are delivered delicately and quietly, like a secret.

The names of people make up the majority of the track titles on What's New, Tomboy?, imbuing the songs with a disarming sense of personhood. On 'Fool Maria', a finger-picked gem, Jurado sings "But you're no fool, Maria / With your half-moon crescent eyelids dipping like a curtain / To let you know it's over. / We are fiction as it's written / the bleeding ink on paper / Quiet as an aeroplane before it hits the mountain". These are not universally applicable poems. They're meant for specificity.

This album is a sparse offering with ten tracks, and I wish it were longer. It's a lovely thing in which to luxuriate. That said, perhaps its fleeting nature is what makes it special. It's a gentle meander of an album.

• 8/10, out now.