JOE HENRY

The Gospel According To Water

EARMUSIC 8/10 Fifteenth solo effort from American master is a profound, folk-rooted gem

Given his serial production work these past two decades – the last 18 months alone have seen top-drawer collaborations with Rosanne Cash, Rhiannon Giddens and Joan Baez – it’s sometimes easy to lose sight of the fact that Joe Henry is one of America’s most accomplished and engaging songwriters. The Gospel According To Water, however, has a little more riding on it than mere talent. Henry was diagnosed with Stage 4 prostate cancer in November 2018, forcing him to cancel various things and lay low for a while, before going public with his illness at a live show in Los Angeles this summer. He then booked a studio for a couple of days, armed with a small group of trusted musicians, and poured out a batch of demos written in the aftermath of his diagnosis. It turned out that they were striking enough on their own merits, free of embellishments, all the more powerful for the immediacy of the moment.

Simplicity is key here. Framed by spare arrangements of mostly acoustic guitar, Henry’s voice (not unlike that of Randy Newman these days) is eloquently poetic as he navigates his way through a trail of emotions, an internal reckoning that aims to separate what matters from what doesn’t. He derives meaning from quotidian pleasures – the title track finds him waking early to admire how the light extends; he hears singing voices on the steps beneath his room in “General Tzu Names The Planets For His Children”. And while there are references to falling stars and spirits flown, there’s also a palpable sense of liberation at play. “If not my season, still could be my glory/if free of living past and future story”, he sings on “In Time For Tomorrow”, a luminous tune delicately weighted with soft clarinet and halo harmonies from Birds Of Chicago’s Allison Russell and JT Nero. The Gospel According To Water is ultimately about love, devotion and deeper truths. As Henry puts it, “beauty in the making of what will go unseen”.