Album Review: Iron & Wine - Ghost On Ghost

It's not always an easy thing to abide when a musician reinvents themselves. Do it too quickly and you'll be accused of jumping the shark; even abandoning fans. Don't do it quickly enough and the critics will start circling with cries of stagnation or lack of ambition. It's a thin tightrope only mastered by those rare chameleons with vision and talent broad enough to pull any kind of seachange off. Sam Beam is one such animal and on Ghost On Ghost, his fifth record under the moniker of Iron & Wine, he has culminated a collection of small shifts shown on previous efforts into a full-blown sunny side up, ecstatic pop record.

Breaking through on his previous album, Kiss Each Other Clean, which rode a combination of Twilight endorsement and general critical mass acceptance to the number two position on the US Billboard chart, Beam has steadily transformed himself from hushed bedroom crooner to Day-Glo ringmaster. Ghost On Ghost kicks off in this manner with the loose and colourful horns of Caught In The Briars and moves through a collection of some of Beam's finest melodies yet. Much has been made of the Austin native's bearded, shed-bound persona (he was Bon Iver before Bon Iver was Birdy), but tracks like Singers & The Endless Song, with it's Al Green-esque backing vocals, and the lazy melancholic splendour of Sundown (Back In The Briars) loan Ghost On Ghost a well-suited accessibility. An ill advised detour into jazz fusion on Lover's Resolution never really takes off, but sits as a testament to the ambition coursing through Beam's wonderfully musical veins. Fingers crossed he lets them flow for some time yet.