New Day With New Possibilities

New Day with New Possibilities, the latest 'country' offering by Sonny and the Sunsets, is clearly a companion piece to the cult loved third Sunsets release Longtime Companion, the laid back country record which marked the beginning of the Sunsets as an explorative project and not just locked into one sound. New Day With New Possibilities joins with a kind of Michael Hurley home grown sound but also leaning into Chelsea Girls baroque strings sound as on Driftin’ and The Lonely Men. Pedal Steel maestro Joe Goldmark lifts the record into Doug Sahm and Buck Owens territory. As much as the music ushers in a laid-back country feeling, the lyrics are where this album depart. Lonely Men, a Bill Calahan-ish dry observational take, is a searing damnation of broken men who cannot find the capacity to fully love. Lyrically Smith sets the goals high, Earl and His Girl and Ride the Dark Trail both sound like William Burroughs wrote a Louis L'amour style Western paperback.