SCOTT COOK TAKES US ON ANOTHER TRIP

Scott Cook isn’t so much a musician as a bipedal (sometimes) lifestyle — the confidently feline Edmonton singer-songwriter travelling the globe as a professional musician for 10 years now, playing bars, festivals, living rooms and up in the jungle trees.

Like all his recordings, Further Down the Line is all about the journey, this time from butt shaking in the kitchen to outdoor funeral arrangements, where, someday hopefully a long time from now, Cook hopes the land will take “all of me and feed me to

the flower dreaming underneath the snow. That’s how I’m learning to let go.”

It’s a great, soulful and inquisitive album from the get-go, the opener a love letter to Woody Guthrie, which Cook in the notes acknowledges has been done by many a folksinger — he’s just happy to be on the river with friends.

Speaking of the documentation, the disc comes in a simply beautiful package — an annotated photo book with chapters on recording, Cook’s life so far in both words and pictures from the road. This look under the hood is amazing and very generous.

He explains straightforwardly that he wants you to play his songs, and used the “folk process” on his pretty cover of Heather Styka’s Careful With My Heart, adjusting the lyrics so they made more sense for a tall brother like him to be singing. Fellas, Get Out the Way is especially thought-provoking, jazzy and lovely, like this whole acoustic ride a pleasure.

Alberta, You’re Breaking My Heart personifies our complex province as an ex-girlfriend who’s using and destroying herself, while Dogs and Kids cheerfully acknowledges the inevitable passage of time, and for whom we make memories. If He Showed Up Now questions how Christ would be received today (imagine him as an immigrant refugee, for example), and Walk That Lonesome Valley takes a look at the courage of Sojourner Truth, Father Daniel Berrigan and Chelsea Manning, the last one recently pardoned by President Obama. Look them up if you don’t know their tales, or better yet buy this album.

One second short of 42 minutes, this record is a real trip — Cook speaks of self-doubt in this book, but a lot of us are thankful for his ongoing courage to let us know about the courage of others in song.