BLITZEN TRAPPER

Destroyer of the Void

[Sub Pop]

Search YouTube and you’ll discover that the gods blessed us with a live cover version of the Band’s “I Shall Be Released” by Fleet Foxes and Jeff Tweedy. Blitzen Trapper’s Eric Earley lacks Tweedy’s brave introspection, but he sure sounds a hell of a lot like him, and his group’s fifth album extends the classic-rock spirit of that four-minute clip further than the Wilco frontman has on his own records. Like Robbie Robertson and Harvest-era Neil Young, Earley understands that while rock may have started as something for horny teenagers, it can also be made for the rugged, solitary men who star in Cormac McCarthy novels. The half-stable, half-frantic title song will work just fine for people who’ve worn out their copy of Zeppelin’s “Over the Hills and Far Away,” and the harmonically perfect oohs and aahs (no doubt influenced by that time spent on tour with the aforementioned Foxes) are a reminder that there’s beauty in the lonely wilderness.

–DS