Kurt Vile - 2015 - B'lieve I'm Goin Down

 

Matador – OLE-1033-2  366.25MB FLAC

b’lieve i’m goin down... finds Kurt Vile settling even further into the loose, inward style that had become unmistakably his own by 2015. Released by Matador, the album moves between fingerpicked acoustic guitar, electric haze, banjo, piano and understated rhythm sections without ever sounding particularly interested in dramatic changes of direction. Instead, Vile lets songs unspool gradually, repeating phrases and guitar figures until they begin to feel less like formal compositions than extended states of mind.

“Pretty Pimpin” opens the album with one of Vile’s most immediately memorable songs. The guitar figure is bright and circular, while the lyric turns a mundane encounter with a mirror into a strange moment of self-dislocation. That combination is central to the album: everyday observations delivered in a relaxed voice suddenly tipping into anxiety, confusion or existential humor. Vile often sounds amused by his own thoughts even when those thoughts are leading somewhere darker.

“I’m an Outlaw” brings banjo into the picture without becoming conventional country music. The instrument is used more for texture and pulse than for genre signaling, sitting comfortably beside Vile’s dry vocal delivery. “Dust Bunnies” returns to the hazier guitar sound associated with his earlier records, while “That’s Life, tho (almost hate to say)” stretches out into one of the album’s more expansive pieces. The songs rarely hurry. They accumulate.

“Wheelhouse” is one of the record’s deepest slow-burners, built around guitar lines that seem to drift in circles rather than move toward a fixed destination. “Life Like This” uses piano as a central instrument, giving the song a heavier, more grounded feel. “All in a Daze Work” is even more subdued, almost skeletal at points, with Vile’s voice sitting inside a sparse arrangement that emphasizes the record’s late-night quality.

“Lost My Head There” pushes the album into a stranger rhythmic space, while “Stand Inside” is comparatively warm and direct. “Bad Omens,” “Kidding Around” and “Wild Imagination” continue the record’s mixture of repetition, understated humor and slightly blurred emotional states. “Wild Imagination” closes the album without a large climax, which fits the overall approach. The record does not resolve so much as drift to a stop.

The production is important because b’lieve i’m goin down... sounds intimate without being crude. Vile recorded in several locations, including sessions in California and the northeastern United States, but the album maintains a consistent atmosphere. Instruments are given plenty of space, and even fuller arrangements retain the sensation of somebody playing alone in a room. Vile’s guitar remains the center, but piano, banjo, percussion and additional players gradually widen the sound around him.

The artwork mirrors that mixture of casualness and oddity. The front photograph shows Vile seated outdoors holding a resonator guitar, dressed plainly against a rough wall and backyard setting. Inside, photographs of pedals, rugs and a large star embedded in the ground continue the informal, almost scrapbook-like presentation. The back cover uses a close-up outdoor photograph with the track list written directly over the image in Vile’s loose handwriting. The whole package feels personal without looking deliberately polished.

This Oakland Public Library copy came through the 81st Avenue branch, with branch labels on the front and disc, a classification sticker, barcode and library hub marking added to the original packaging. The disc carries a photograph of a pedalboard under the handwritten album title, continuing the home-recording and rehearsal-room feel of the artwork.

b’lieve i’m goin down... works because Kurt Vile never forces the songs to become bigger than they need to be. The record is full of small guitar figures, repeated thoughts, minor observations and moments of uncertainty that gradually become absorbing through repetition. It is relaxed without being empty, funny without turning into comedy, and melancholy without announcing itself as such. The album’s best moments sound like someone following a thought until he is no longer completely sure where it began.

—ChatGPT