With Pith and Vinegar, Headlong Retreat delivers a musically adventurous and thematically urgent anthem, driven by the sardonic pen of Bill Neely. Known for his sharp wit and socially conscious songwriting, Neely teams up with a far-flung collective of collaborators to create this eclectic concoction of folk, jazz, Latin rhythms, doo-wop harmonies, and Appalachian grit all coalescing into a singular statement of defiance.
The album opens with “Headlong,” a brief but striking a cappella invocation inspired by Pilgrim’s Progress. Built on Appalachian Sacred Harp tradition, the track’s interweaving voices pose a karmic reckoning for wrongdoers, setting the spiritual and political tone for what follows.
The fifth track, “Resistance,” erupts as the album’s firebrand anthem. A powerful protest song built on tight drums and glinting cymbals, it carries the vigor of classic rock with a renewed 21st-century urgency, because the system has found a way to get its hands dirty once more. Neely’s voice is gritty yet resolute as he urges, “Roll up your sleeves and let’s start cleaning up this mess.”
Later, “Cassandra’s Lament” dials into something quieter yet equally potent. A mournful, string-laced ballad, it takes the myth of Cassandra—the prophet no one believed—and remakes it as a siren call for our contemporary times. The plucked guitar and patient pacing let every word linger. The vocals, rich and dusky, weave through a landscape that reminds you of Ireland’s stormy cliffs, haunted by foresight and futility.
“Good Night, and Good Luck” closes Pith and Vinegar with steady drums and warm harmonies that pay homage to Edward R. Murrow’s resilience in the face of tyranny. Through it all, Pith and Vinegar has become a sharply aware, deeply felt, and musically fearless album.
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Design by Rebecca Hamilton
Review by: Naomi Joan