"Love was a promise made of smoke in a frozen copse of trees"

Iron & Wine - The Shepherd's Dog (Sub Pop, 2007)


Iron & Wine’s newest album, The Shepherd’s Dog, is one of my favourite albums of 2007. Why? First, because the songs are both beautiful, and the lyrics even more cryptic than on previous albums. Second, Sam Beam continues his musical evolution in a creative fashion: listening to The Creek Drank The Cradle (2002) and say, In The Reins (2005). Or even, Our Endless Numbered Days (2004) – the progression is constant and expanding – I get wait to hear what he does next time!
The Shepherd’s Dog is a combination of the work he’s done with Calexico, and Our Endless Numbered Days; in regards to the former, this is heard mostly through instrumentation, arrangement, and production, whereas the latter makes its presence known via the lyrical quality and intonation. It’s a very interesting combination that delivers some real gems, like “Carousel,” “Resurrection Fern,” and Flightless Bird, American Mouth.”

Let’s take a closer peek…


1. “Pagan Angel And A Borrowed Car” This is a really nice song, and really nice to hear so early on in the album. It is at once an introduction and a re-introduction; this song melds Sam Beam’s traditional sound with new elements like strings, piano, and electronics. Truth be told, this shouldn’t be anything new to anyone who really listened to In The Reins. The lyrics are, as always, cryptic and hypnotically emoted. I would see this as some type of anti-war song but not without an honour of its own. “The shiny blades of pagan angels/In our father’s skies,” leaves little to the imagination. I could be wrong, but the last verse makes me think it’s about Israel/Palestine. The last line in the song makes me feel really happy for obvious reasons: “While with his gun the pagan angel rose to say/”My love is one made to break every bended knee.” Reeking of defiance, one thinks of the pagan angel himself (Satan) and his great refusal. (Whither Daedalus?)
2. “White Tooth Man” opens up with some Middle-Eastern sounding slide accompanied by some bongo beats with Sam Beam’s close breathlessly driving – how now oh folk whisperer! This song is actually quite a downer, chilling even; it seems to be obsessed with disappointment and despair. But maybe the despair is directed more at ourselves, especially when we realize that we don’t have quite what it takes to change a situation.
3. “Love Song Of The Buzzard” is a more familiar sounding Sam Beam, until the accordion that is. To me this song has an uncomprehendingly sad premise behind it, at which I’ll give my two cents. This seems like a girl named Lucy has died (maybe a baby) and soon she’ll “bloom” (rot, etc.) and then the buzzard will do its part. The lyric “no one is the savior they would like to be,” is chilling (this is where the organ kicks in). “The cradle’s unimaginative sense of time,” is another hint. But for sure, it sounds like he’s talking about the frustration of not being able to make someone get better, or keep them from dying. This is evident in the 3rd and 4th lines especially, which to me signifies a death. There are also a lot of cool instruments on this track. Great stuff.
4. “Carousel” opens with a beautiful arpeggio over wave sounds. Beam’s voice is surprisingly altered here, a very watery sound. It’s weird hearing his voice like this but I think it sounds pretty cool and it achieves the effect desired. It’s a very morose song and the imagery deals with the Iraq war, which makes the under-water effect so potent. I think this song deals with a family that has someone serving, and finding it difficult to cope with anti-war sentiment and the general strain it places on a family. After the first few verses, the meaning becomes less clear.
5. “House By The Sea” is an interesting song. It starts with this weird sounding instrument, maybe a bass sax? When the song gets started, it also has this beautiful but understated guitar riff that plays underneath everything. It is a faster tempo song, clearly influenced by Calexico and Co. If Iron & Wine were a different band, say The Decemberists, this song might be classified as a shanty. Not so in this case, it can only be classified as a bayou ballad, in just about every sense imaginable. Around 3:55 things get “whacked,” as the kids say.
6. “Innocent Bones” is more traditional Sam Beam, with a nicely plucked banjo and acoustic guitar but also joined by a number of other elements, from piana to xylophone. This song is well-crafted and is ostensibly a remark on religion (or the Christians, in particular). This lyric is particularly insightful: “[T]he cartoon king has a tattoo of a bleeding heart/ There ain’t a penthouse Christian wants the pain of the scab but they all want the scar.”
7. “Wolves (Song of the Shepherd’s Dog)” is also a solid song. It brings to mind an open-air jamboree at sunset, attended by lovers of blues and jazz and performed by the same. The last two minutes or so is pretty fun to listen to, especially if you follow this song with something off of The Creek Drank The Cradle.
8. “Resurrection Fern” is very Endless Numbered Days-ish to me, with its feverishly plucked rhythm and enchanting, heartfelt lyrics. Beam’s voice projects out like a beacon across the swamp, slide guitar in tow to mark the indefinable uneasiness while his steady finger-picking keeps impeccable time. The lyrics are beautiful and hushed, like he’s letting us in on a secret childhood friendship – a kind that we all have but just never really talk about. Maybe he or she moved away, maybe you did; maybe you went to different high schools – whatever – the point is his stunning ability to make the minute loom large.
9. “Boy With A Coin” ” is somewhat of a jagged tune that slithers from the speakers like an apostate serpent. It was released as a single before the full length, along with “Kingdom of the Animals,” and “Carried Home.” It is a playful sounding song (albeit with rather dark lyrics) complete with handclaps, a great sounding instrument (maybe from Africa or Middle East?), and wah-wah pedals. Mesmerizing.
10. “The Devil Never Sleeps” is quite different than anything we’ve heard Sam Beam do before. Here is a piano-driven jazz song, infected with a Chuck Berry/Jerry Lee Lewis-fied Sam Beam. It’s great, it’s up-tempo and new for Iron & Wine, and brings to mind soul music, or swamp jazz if there is such a thing.
11. “Peace Beneath The City” is another dark sounding song, but closer to the traditional Iron & Wine sound. The effects in this song make it pretty disturbing – not a novel thing on this record.
12. “Flightless Bird, American Mouth” is a beautiful song, a perfect album-closer, and also tries to console those old-school fans who despise the “new” Sam Beam. It’s a slow-building ballad about loss of another America; a place where kids ride bikes all over the place, and you could buy 10-cent candy. The last part is what it has become: the fat-cats who are supposed to protect the house from rats instead do nothing; their tongues “sore and blunt,” presumably from “Those fishing lures thrown into the cold and clean/Blood of Christ mountain stream.” It’s a great way to end the album, a little new but comes back to the old – but make no mistake, Iron & Wine is not simply hushed swamp indie; it’s something else entirely.


The Sheperd’s Dog surprised me in a number of ways, all positive. I really love that there is a steady progression of musical ideas and experimentation, both in previous albums but also that which can be heard from listening to this one. I also found myself floundering at the meanings of the songs themselves more than ever, and who knows, maybe there really isn’t much meaning to them. Rather, I feel there is somewhat of a meaning, like a loose outline to some of these songs, and feel too that some of the lyrics weren’t meant to tell a story, or add to a pre-existing one. And that’s just fine.
I am drawn to this type of music, which I liken to Bonnie Prince Billy in the way that it seems to be expressing, or archiving, a type of music that is pastoral, dirty, truthful, and very very dark. I have always thought of Oldham as singing the songs of the Appalachias, whereas Beam's stewardship begins closer to the end of South Carolina. His music feels like a reactant, whipping up some old Jungian memory that deep inside, in the data strains of our cells, we know.

You can buy the album here.


Iron and Wine has a number of live songs up on YouTube right here., all of which are pretty, pretty great. Plus, it’s always nice to see him play guitar.


- Adam Smith