Anyone who has followed
Kasey Chambers' career in the nearly two decades since she released her outstanding solo debut
The Captain knows she's as willful as she is talented. In the grand tradition of
Neil Young, whatever
Chambers did last year doesn't necessarily mean a thing about what she's going to do this year, and she's confident enough to follow her muse wherever it leads. So while 2018's
Campfire might be unexpected, it shouldn't really surprise her fans -- in the wake of 2017's
Dragonfly,
Chambers' biggest and most ambitious album to date, she's created a purposefully spare and compact effort that, true to its title, sounds like it could easily have been recorded around a campfire.
Chambers cut
Campfire with
the Fireside Disciples, an ad hoc acoustic ensemble featuring
Brandon Dodd of Grizzly Train on guitar,
Alan Pigram of Scrap Metal, and the Pigram Brothers on mandolin (he also contributes vocals in Yawuru, an indigenous Australian language, on the opening cut), and
Kasey's father
Bill Chambers on dobro. The arrangements are often whisper quiet but the performances are full of subtle strength, and the lack of electricity does nothing to dull the passion of the delivery. (
Chambers even dispenses with accompaniment on "Go on Your Way" in favor of a cappella harmonies.) And
Chambers revels in the dynamics of this music, sounding playful and jaunty on "Junkyard Man," rueful and heartsick on "Orphan Heart," and struggling with faith and reality on "Abraham," and regardless of the themes, she sounds perfectly authentic, strong of spirit but hardly immune to the weaknesses of human existence. And while
Emmylou Harris and
Bill Chambers both make memorable vocal contributions,
Campfire is a rare example of a headliner giving her collaborators all the space they need without ceding authority, capturing the spotlight without hogging it. Even more than on her two acoustic collaborations with
Shane Nicholson,
Campfire is
Kasey Chambers at her most unadorned and elemental, and shows she can work magic with the simplest materials at her disposal. ~ Mark Deming