For two decades and across a dozen or so studio releases, Pokey LaFarge has carved out a niche for himself with his brand of old-timey-meets-newfangled boogie rock gospel blues. While at times a little hokey and hackneyed, the crooner’s modern-old sound has, for years, felt singular.
Now, at a time when originality and creativity exists at the mercy of algorithms and artifice, that sound is a gift, with his latest album Rent Money one more present for the present.
Throughout the 11-track collection, tight, well-balanced compositions springboard the artist’s kitchen-sink Americana, giving life to shadowy sambas like “Told You No” and funk-soul anthems like the swaggering “Stick Together” and the tip-toeing title track. The result feels complex, but textbook LaFarge: all at once pragmatic and boundless, orderly and feverish, a softly eccentric concoction from vaudeville’s stiffest upper lip.
