Forever Neil Young
Austin quintet Milton Mapes adds nothing to the alt.country/roots-rock equation that Uncle Tupelo and Crazy Horse didn’t perfect years before. But if you’re going to borrow, you might as well borrow from the best. The nine songs on The Blacklight Trap are steeped in the smoldering, winding guitar anthems of mid-’70s Crazy Horse, and lead singer/songwriter Greg Vanderpool pulls off a very credible Neil Young/Jay Farrar impersonation. What sets this music apart, though, is the distilled poetic despair of Vanderpool’s songwriting. Whether chronicling the perils of the bottle (the title track), the tragic fate of the Cherokee Nation (“Underneath the River Runs”), or the wistful longing of separated lovers (“Craters of the Moon”) Vanderpool evokes a landscape of the heart that is stark, desolate and uncommonly beautiful.