Joe Henry's Blood From Stars

The same week that Richmond Fontaine's new album blindsided me, Joe Henry released Blood From Stars, his latest in a string of dark jazz-Americana explorations. He's played with the idea of jazz-rock fusion in the past - he even had Ornette Coleman and Bill Frisell featured on Scar and Civilians, respectively - but never has he gotten this close to creating a straight-up jazz record. Like almost every idea he has, it works.

On a Joe Henry solo record you can always expect great guest musicians; this time Marc Ribot and jazz pianist Jason Moran lend a hand. The latter opens the record with a dark spare piano solo, setting the mood for Henry's bleakest record since Scar. This time, his topics lean toward loneliness and loss and opposed to tackling political issues the way he did on Civilians.

This albums feels more like a concept piece that works as an album - their aren't as many notable highlights as there were on past records, which probably means he is more content with his cult status. "Death To The Storm" is a pastoral sounding angry blues track with a gospel chorus and some of Marc Ribot's best soloing. "Bellweather" finds Henry in romantic 50's jazz swooning mode and "Progress Of Love" shows that he can write corny love ballads as well as any pop singer (yes, that was a compliment).

This album probably won't win him any new fans or critical acclaim - amazingly, he didn't earn either of those with his 2007 masterpiece Civilians (still my frontrunner for most underrated album of the decade). If you want to get into Joe, start there and keep going. The run of Scar, Tiny Voices, Civilians, and Blood From Stars makes Joe Henry one of the greatest musicians and innovators of this decade.