OUROBOROS

“Never going to hear this song on the radio,” Ray Lamontagne sings at the close of his new album.

If that sounds like a complaint, in context it reads more like a boast. Lamontagne has seemingly fashioned his sixth album, Ouroboros, as a work of private exploration, a vehicle for divining the inner life far more than a product designed to glad-hand its way up the pop charts.

In that sense, Ouroboros greatly extends the path Lamontagne set out on his last work, 2014’s Supernova. Both works favor sounds that implicate rather than state, making full use of fuzz-toned guitars, hazy production and blurry vocal cascades. Likewise, both albums pair the singer with strong-minded producers who double as stars. Supernova matched Lamontagne with The Black Keys’ Dan Auerbach. Ouroboros features production from My Morning Jacket’s Jim James.

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Ray Lamontagne - OUROBOROS Review