THE PRESS RELEASE: “Brian Fallon’s rock star days are firmly behind him. And no one is more accepting of that fact than Brian Fallon. Having recently turned 40, the New Jersey legend has left more than his youth in his rearview. His former outfit, The Gaslight Anthem, reunited for a string of reunion shows in 2018 but now only exists in that murky grey area known as “indefinite hiatus.” He released two well-received solo albums in the past four years, 2016’s Painkillers and 2018’s Sleepwalkers, but even those records dwell more in the rock genre than anywhere else. Now, with his new solo album, Local Honey, Fallon has made the record he has always wanted to make and has put himself in a place to release it exactly as he pleases. Its acoustic-leaning, introspective, singer-songwriter artistry is a benchmark of a time and place, a heartfelt and grown-up sound that has been in his mind and in his heart for a long while. Unique amongst his output, Local Honey is a snapshot of Fallon’s current existence and a masterstroke from an artist whose songwriting talent is boiling over. “I want people to see where I am now,” Fallon says. “I’m 40, I’ve got two kids, a wife, a house — that’s who I am. I’m not really trying to do any thing, I’m trying to step away from that. I just want to tell stories and write songs that mean something to me. And if you’re aging the same way I am then hopefully they mean something to you, too.”
MY TWO CENTS: The Gaslight Anthem were a great band. And maybe they will be again sometime. But until that day comes, we’ll just have to get by with albums like Local Honey, the latest solo outing from singer-guitarist and songwriter Brian Fallon. Thankfully, that won’t be much of a hardship. Make no mistake: Local Honey doesn’t pack the same sonic wallop as GA classics like The ’59 Sound. But it does deliver eight slices of intimately romantic art-roots balladry fuelled by his literate lyrics, lightly sanded crooning and bittersweet melodies. Just think of them as The Candlelight Anthems.
