Christopher Paul Stelling – Labor Against Waste

Christopher Paul Stelling is still a young man, and a contemporary, but everything about 'Labor Against Waste' has the feeling and power of an ancient backwoods classic....
Christopher Paul Stelling : Labor Against Waste
8.0 Anti/Epitaph
2015 

Christopher Paul Stelling : Labor Against Waste

Christopher Paul Stelling might have just been ‘another alt-folk singer/songwriter’, of the kind that there seems to be so many of these days. However, Stelling has managed to move up in the world, and rightfully so, with powerful records like 2012’s Songs of Praise and Scorn (QRO review), 2013’s False Cities (QRO review), and now the revival-like drive of Labor Against Waste.

Stelling has the power of a preacher on Labor, but one who knows the bad as well as the good (think Joel Theriot in season one of True Detective). He gets the ghost despite the devil in him on “Horse”, brings finger-plucking wisdom in the preceding “Castle”, and see dark times a-comin’ in the following “Death of Influence”. He delivers intimate twang with opener “Warm Energy”, and a powerful elegy in closer “Too Far North”.

Christopher Paul Stelling is still a young man, and a contemporary, but everything about Labor Against Waste has the feeling and power of an ancient backwoods classic. Just like it should.

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