3 out of 5

Label: Karate Body Records

Produced by: Kevin Ratterman (recorded by)

All the pieces are in place for something rustic; heavy; sneering but sincere. “Love Hangover” is a great title; Old Baby as a group name can work a few ways, but paired with the band’s location in Louisville, Kentucky – home of oddballs like Wild Oldham, or socialized folksters My Morning Jacket, or post-rock blues of Young Widows – we can interpret Old Baby well enough: fresh faced, yet set in their ways.

Straightforward tales of plaintive status quos are delivered by frontman Jonathan Glen Wood – a fantastically aged sounding name; something you’d see scrawled on a library card, or at the bottom of an old, hopeful Valentine – his somehow both eager and flat voice set atop minimalist grooves that occasionally splash into backwoods psychedelia, or runs of heavy-hitting drums and distortion.

“Splash” is a key word here, though, and Love Hangover doesn’t quite exceed the sum of its parts, mixed or mastered in such a way that songs rarely seem to capitalize on their dynamics; a potential richness that only hits two or three times throughout.

Those two or three times are really suggestive of what this could be, though, with a very meaty, dark swell of indie folk that’s bumped into rock with heavier guitar and bass lines, and a wonderfully ear-wormy central riff. Wood sings clear and holds notes well, talking / crooning in a fashion that’s direct without it feeling singer / songwriter-y. The opener and followup title track carry this well, with ‘Young’ then introducing the other, primary mode of the group as much more stripped back, and reliant on basic melodies and Wood’s words. As they’re pretty on-the-nose, these tracks don’t necessarily dig as deep without a more prominent rhythm section; the – as mentioned – way this is ultimately mastered doesn’t play up either the low- or high-ends too well (though I had a better time when upping the treble on a mixer, getting some more nuance in the vocal layer*); in other words, these more bare tracks should be more akin to singer-songwriter work, but neither Jonathan’s vocals or the lyrics are necessarily strong enough to make that stick, and the briefest moments when the rest of the band kicks in are both too fleeting and not quite impactful enough in the mix to sell it. But it’s right on the cusp of working.

As such, the drips of full-on success – which are spaced well across the disc – make it an engaging listen, to the extent that I keep coming back for more. …Even if I also keep wishing there was more.

*My initial listens of this were on digital; after going back and listening to the vinyl, I’d say it was mastered with vinyl in mind. It definitely sounds better there, though my ears were sensitive to the effects mentioned, and overall – the commentary still feels valid.