Steve Wynn – Make It Right

Fire

As the Renaissance Man of the recently reinvigorated Paisely Underground scene family, Steve Wynn has enjoyed another purple patch over the last decade or so — with a redemptive five-album reunion run for The Dream Syndicate and the first volume of his autobiography being top of the creative output list. So much so that we haven’t quite noticed the absence of a proper solo studio long-player since 2010’s Miracle 3-backed Northern Aggression.

During this gap, the truly faithful – who have supported Wynn’s chameleonic career moves between both eras of The Dream Syndicate — have been sated with a series of self-billed low-key releases of archival, live, demos and covers material, as well as stripped-down electric and acoustic rewinds through his bulky back catalogue.

However, now that Wynn has taken the time to properly resume his solo journey, with the nonchalantly anointed Make It Right, it feels like another Leonardo da Vinci-with-a-six-string move is in order, rather than just straightforwardly picking up where he left off twelve years ago. Satisfyingly then, as with the creatively successful touring and recording reunions with The Dream Syndicate, Make It Right offers both kaleidoscopic flashbacks to previously traversed paths and strong shifts in fresher directions.

 

Dovetailing lyrically with the memory-mining required for his near-simultaneously dispensed I Wouldn’t Say It If It Wasn’t True memoir, whilst dexterously flipping between elements in his own past recorded output and other divergent decades-straddling sources of inspiration, this is arguably one of Wynn’s most thoughtful, free-range and nimble solo LPs to date.

With guests ranging from assorted members of Wynn’s reunified day-job band, The Miracle 3 and The Baseball Project to a clutch of newer accomplices, the one-man vision is fleshed out with a wide but not overloaded communalist presentation. Whilst on the first few airings the variety of stylings, textures and production values feels a little fragmented, on successive spins it transpires that the élan of the eclecticism is what gives the record its radiant magnetism.

Therefore, in more familiar terrain, we’re treated to Californian-style road-tripping (with the joyous brass and harmony-topped “Santa Monica”), VU-chug-meets-motorik grittiness (“Making Good On My Promises” and “Roosevelt Avenue”), languid Bob Dylan meandering (the title track and “Simpler Than Rain”) and hirsute ‘70s Byrdsian Americana (“You’re Halfway There”).

Elsewhere, through the less-recognisably-Steve Wynn passages, there are fruitful detours into Suicide-goes-dark-funk prowling (“What Were You Expecting”), the sultrier routes of latter-day Calexico (“Cherry Avenue”) and lushly-arranged nods to the symphonic entries in the Lee Hazlewood canon (“Madly”).

With plenty of rewarding layers to keep unpeeling through return visits, Make It Right is the most go-to sole-trading set from Steve Wynn this side of 2003’s equally essential Static Transmission.

-Adrian-