Talk to an audio consultant

IRON AND WINE - THE SHEPHARD'S DOG (LP)

Iron and Wine The Shephard's Dog On Vinyl LP

The last that we heard form Iron and Wine was the six songs comprising Woman King released in 2005. (This doesn't include the collaborative In the Reins EP which featured songs by Iron and Wine's Sam Beam and performances by both Iron and Wine and Calexico together.) What distinguished Woman King from its predecessors was the deepening integration of spiraling, dense  opuses (Gray Stables,” Evening on the Ground (Lilith's Song)) with intimate confessionals (Jezebel,” My Lady's House).  

On The Shepherd's Dog this integration is complete. Compositionally, it is Iron and Wine's most ambitious and accomplished recording to date. It’s also the most satisfying.

While many of us learned of Iron and Wine by way of Sam Beam's tender and spare rendering of The Postal Service's Such Great Heights on the Garden State soundtrack, those who dug deeper discovered a classic American tunesmith with a precocious musical signature. Songs like Lion's Mane,” Jesus  the Mexican Boy and Naked as We Came are remarkable demonstrations of craft; musically memorable, lyrically evocative and casually atmospheric.  

The whole album breathes. Its seductive rhythms percolate and undulate, from the Psych-Bhangra-redux of Pagan Angel and a Borrowed Car to the album's last dance—a waltz—Flightless Bird, American Mouth.” And there's nary a trapkit on the whole album! 

Resurrection Fern,” a staple of Iron and Wine's live performances, is given a somber, elegant treatment here while my two personal favorites, Wolves (Song of the Shepherd's Dog) and Carousel,” summon, in their respective ways, a vivid otherworldliness. Taken as a whole, The Shepherd's Dog is informed by a sensuality that brings a dreamscape to life. 

Iron and Wine The Shephard's Dog  Track Listing

1. Pagan Angel and a Borrowed Car
2. White Tooth Man
3. Lovesong of the Buzzard
4. Carousel
5. House by the Sea
6. Innocent Bones
7. Wolves (Song of the Shepherd’s Dog)
8. Resurrection Fern
9. Boy with a Coin
10. The Devil Never Sleeps
11. Peace Beneath the City
12. Flightless Bird, American Mouth