Lucero are a band who know how to rock, and they do so with force, authority, and passion. They also know how to turn down the amps and ease off on the tempo without losing a bit of their intensity and impact, and that's what
Lucero are up to on 2021's
When You Found Me. Many of the songs on the album sound as if they're leading up to a big dynamic explosion that, on most of these tracks, never happens; however, in this case, that's not a liability but an asset. Nearly all the songs on
When You Found Me trade in uncertainty and doubt, in human relationships (romantic, familial, and otherwise) that could seemingly fall apart at any moment, and the dramatic tension in
Ben Nichols' vocals fits the slow-burning fuse of the music like bourbon and Coca-Cola.
Lucero don't make the edgy doubt of these songs sound comfortable, but they do make them sound vivid and real, and few albums of recent memory capture the tense ennui and coffee, cigarettes, and troubling thoughts at 3 a.m. as effectively as
When You Found Me. "Good as Gone" and "Back in Ohio" are two songs where
Lucero break out and rock, and when they do, they hit their targets without compromising the anxiety at the heart of this set of songs. The closing title track is a message of love and gratitude that provides a guiding light without pretending the darkness is gone for good, regardless of the succor found in another human heart.
When You Found Me is an album that's often dark without ever sounding maudlin or self-pitying; it's an acknowledgment of the search for better days created with the knowledge that they're hard to measure without the pain as a point of comparison. If you want to hear
Lucero kick out the jams,
When You Found Me will not be your cup of poison, but if you want to hear a great American band bear their souls with fearless grace, this is a must. ~ Mark Deming