“American Man, American Music” is aptly named from the start. The opening of “Nobody’s Gonna Make It Out Alive” is as classic as the Americana sound gets, immediately casting Pope as an itinerant road dog, “singin’ Sweet Home Alabama for the one paying customer”—a line as glorious as you’ll find.
The characters in these songs aren’t the “Tommy’s, Gina’s, and Wendy’s” of US mythology. Instead, on “I Gotta Change (Or I’m Gonna Die),” we meet a man who laments, “Oxys beat me like I owed him money.” I can pay the song no higher compliment than to say it would be a standout on a Jason Isbell collection.
Pope unearths remarkable stories from the shadows. On “Klonopin Zombies” (and being from England, where—thankfully—we don’t have the same opioid crisis as the US, a quick Google search was required), he apologizes, “Sorry for cursing, but I’m f**ked up and hurting,” while the harmonica is simply glorious.
From harmonica to harmonies, the tender “In The Morning Put The Coffee On” is drenched in warmth, and “I Pray I’ll Be Seeing You Soon” carries an old-time country feel, its fiddles leafing through the Great American Songbook before writing a new chapter.
It’s that good. I reviewed one of his albums a few years back, and it was brilliant—this one is better. Way better.
There’s a full-band feel to this, too. And my goodness, Pope can write a chorus. “The Queen Of Fort Payne, Alabama” looks back at family and good times, reminiscing about “which one of us had sinned” without a hint of regret.
“I’m Not The Devil” takes a different turn. A claustrophobic, late-night confessional, the harmonies here are haunting.
“Mama Drove A Mustang” is steeped in regret. “I left home to chase a dream, but a dream ain’t what I found,” he sings. On an album where nearly every track is a standout, this one might shine the brightest.
“Where You’re Kept” occasionally finds Pope in a half-whisper, as if confessing his sins. A record that feels like a series of documentaries about the people he’s encountered along the way closes with an acoustic number, “The Life In Your Years,” which ties it all together—personal, familial, and deeply introspective.
On “Mama Drove A Mustang,” he gets to the crux of the thing: “I had pretty much everything I ever wanted, but it still wasn’t enough.” As Therapy? pointed out long ago, happy people have no stories. This album is for the rest of us. And when the dust settles on 2025, it might just stand as the album of the year.
Rating: 10/10
