Lucero keeps Ben Nichols busy. The Memphis-based collective has been going strong since 1998, touring constantly and releasing acclaimed albums, such as their 12th LP Should’ve Learned by Now (2023). Earlier this year, Nichols and Rick Steff put out Lucero Unplugged, a collection of stripped-down favorites from the band’s vast discography. It’s no wonder that In the Heart of the Mountain (July 25), is only Nichols’ second solo album and first in 16 years.
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Though Lucero’s songs are often gritty and rough-hewn, the melancholy that seeps from In the Heart of the Mountain is distinct from Nichols’ primary project. There is no room here for rollicking songs such as “One Last F.U.” from Lucero’s last record. Instead, Nichols has written a collection of haunting songs inspired by his Arkansas upbringing and the poetry of Frank Stanford, an American writer who died by suicide in Fayetteville, Arkansas, at age 29 in 1978.
Nichols is no stranger to literary inspiration. His first record, The Last Pale Light in the West (2009), was inspired by Cormac McCarthy’s novel Blood Meridian. Nichols learned about Stanford after a stranger mailed him a copy of the poet’s collected works. Never much of a poetry reader, Nichols saw a symmetry in his own lyrics and Stanford’s lines, which he called “soaked in Southern tones…and pushing at the edges of Southern decorum.” Taken in order, the record’s 11 song titles line up to form a poem, one that serves as a mission statement of sorts for an album that explores the mythos of Southern living.
With MorganEve Swain on violin and backing vocals, Cory Branan on guitar, and Todd Beene on pedal steel and electric guitar, In the Heart of the Mountain allows Nichols to stretch out without the democracy involved with being part of a band. His distinctive voice is higher up in the mix, and the songs here feel introspective and don’t rock like Lucero tracks. They are also more personal. The title track, for example, is a tribute to Nichols’ wife and how she keeps him sane, using a mountain as a metaphor for stability. Meanwhile, lead single “Fading Back into Night” returns to the notion of feeling like a failure, a theme prevalent in Nichols’ songwriting. But rather than turn into a full-throated Lucero sing-along, “Fading” is gentle with its fingerpicked guitar and its poetic imagery of stars vanishing as the sun rises.
Elsewhere, “She’s Starlight in the River” references Don Henley’s “The Boys of Summer” but, instead of a coastal milieu, Nichols invokes the humid magic of an Arkansas summer night. The album closes with “The Devil Takes His Leave,” a meditative, midtempo track that features the lyric, “I don’t know if God has a plan, but I’m sure the Devil does.” But this time, Nichols has his wife and his family to keep Satan away.
For fans of Lucero, In the Heart of the Mountain is an intimate offering, a look at a side of Nichols that is both darker and more tender than his band’s usual output. It is an authentic album of expressive honesty and poetic reach, steeped in the Arkansas lore of Nichols’ youth.
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