Exene Cervenka's has a new album out now on bloodshot records
The Former X singer plays a mix of folk and country.
The foundation of the best punk rock, the music that lasts and remains relevant, isn't self-destructive anger or smash the state bravado, but a sense of alienation and dislocation. The longing of the outsider. No band epitomized the burst of creativity and energy of US punk rock better than X and their lead singer and co-lyricist Exene Cervenka. And even though the expressions of fiery emotions and actions of youth fade or moderate, the search for a roadmap through the desolation persists, and it is why Exene's distinctive lyricism still resonates.
'Somewhere Gone', Exene's first solo album since 1991, is a sometimes dreamy but always intimate, passage through folk and country; subdued but no less edgy. Invoking other artists who travel easily between the worlds of words and music like Leonard Cohen and Patti Smith, Exene's lyrics, and immediately recognizable, simultaneously fragile and totemic vocals, carry all the passion of X without all the loud.
Sonically, Somewhere Gone is a sometimes sparse, sometimes exuberant blend of folk, deep country and wide-open spaces.
Exene plays guitar on most tracks, and her band includes such luminaries as Amy Farris (Dave Alvin, Alejandro Escovedo, Kelly Willis) on cello and viola, Joe Terry (Skeletons, Morells) on piano, producer Lou Whitney (Skeletons) on bass, Dex Romweber on keyboards, Cindy Wasserman (Dead Rock West) and Jason Edge on guitar.
www.bloodshotrecords.com