“Raised in these here badlands – where the weak don’t stand a chance.” That’s the first line of the album, and it tells you everything you need to know about “Plain Simple Honesty.” It’s film noir set to strings — stark, unsettling, and utterly absorbing.
This is Ledfoot’s eighth solo record, and it’s exactly what its title suggests: a collection of brutally honest songs straight from the heart. Across its ten tracks, he tells small yet powerful stories, each one rooted in the darker corners of the human psyche. His characters are damaged, trapped, sometimes beyond redemption — but they endure, somehow.
The instrumentation matches the mood perfectly. In addition to his trademark 12-string, Ledfoot plays baritone guitar, bass, percussion and banjo — the latter his first stringed instrument, and one that still bears the ghost of early heroes Dock Boggs and Roscoe Holcomb. That Appalachian influence seeps through the record’s veins, even as it pushes deeper into the shadows.
The opening “All You Ever Had” sets the tone immediately — raw, world-weary and beautifully bleak. The title track “Plain Simple Honesty” feels like a confession, a weary hand laid on the table. When he’s “behind bars” on “My Empty Heart,” it somehow feels like the right place for him — the right place for this whole sound.
There’s a dark jazz thing haunting “Burning Blue,” its ache heavy and uncertain, while “Crystal River” flows with menace — who knows what dark secrets run beneath its surface? “Hey Ho” breaks the tension a little, urging us to “get it done and have some fun,” but even then, there’s something unsettling in the grin.
“Hard Times” could almost be Springsteen’s territory, but where Springsteen made his “High Hopes” famous, Ledfoot makes them personal. “The Devil’s Game” and “Alone Again” strip things back further, the latter sounding almost fragile, as though the whole thing might collapse under the weight of its honesty.
And then there’s “The Ways Of Man” — a tour de force that nails the human condition: fragile, defiant, and forever on the edge.
Recorded at Studio Nyhagen, the album sees Ledfoot co-producing with Kjartan Hesthagen and Markus O. Klyve, who also adds backing vocals, keyboards, and percussion. Together they’ve created something that sits somewhere between the Norwegian Grammy-winning “Coffin Nails” (2022) and “Outsiders” (2024) — but this time, it’s stripped even barer, colder, and more human.
“Plain Simple Honesty” is exactly that — an unflinching portrait of hard living and harder truths. It lingers, unsettles, and ultimately moves you. A bruised beauty from a man who never looks away.
