Daniel Knox

★★★★ Won’t You Take Me With You H.P. JOHNSON PRESENTS. DL/LP

Fifth studio drama from Illinois’ favourite crooning storyteller.

In the cover photo, a woman is out walking at night. But to where? And will she take Knox with her? Such uncertain and mostly unsettling narratives are the American’s bread and butter, with his delicious baritone and trademark vibrato lending gravitas to every stinging line.

WYTMWY is Knox in typically epic form, a suspenseful fusion of country-folk ballads and Twin Peaks cabaret. But there’s a fresh clarity here too, perhaps due to being recorded much faster than previous albums. Opening with the scenario, “I want to be right where I’m supposed to be/I want to kill everyone close to me,” (Rat Pack swinger King Of The Ball), Knox unspools tales of mystery, romance, sex, violence and solitude. Key track I Saw Someone Alone (“Something brushed up against me at midnight”) could be about any, or all, of those things.