by Philip Moss

The Texan songwriter searches for his own truths in the tall tales of home

As stories get passed from generation to generation, the truth and meaning they were born from can often be lost. The facts become distorted, and the verity blurs into tall tales – from which new morals emerge.

Buck Meek – the Texan guitar player, who over the last few years has found huge success with his band, Big Thief – uses his mind’s eye like a camera. He looks for his own realities in the dark room of his mind – developing the anecdotes of yesteryear into new imagery that makes sense to him today.

As Big Thief’s success has grown, the number of months that Meek spends away from Texas has grown year on year. And while various towns and cities across the globe crop up in Meek’s words – like a road map of his travels – it is the rolling hills and shallow creeks that keep calling back his mind. Canonball! Pt. 2, which acts a natural follow on to the first chapter found on his debut, conjures up a ‘race down to the well,’ as Meek recalls summer days playing his own version of Huck Finn. Initially backed by just his acoustic guitar and the hiss of eight track static, Two Moons shows off Meek the thoughtful muse, as he falls into the ‘mind behind my mind.’ While the Adrianne Lenker co-write, Candle, is so spirited in country heritage – ‘if you don’t have a candle, let me burn in your mind’ – that it could have been pulled from the late, great, Townes Van Zandt’s notebook.

Like the smell of rich, home cooked food drifting from the kitchen, Buck Meek’s Two Saviors is both warm and comforting. A document from the heartlands by a man whose life is lived on the road.