Greg Freeman wouldn’t be the first American to wander, cheesy statements about DNA to one side, but his route to here has certainly been an unorthodox one by many standards. Until the start of the decade part of a small but active community of interconnected musicians in Burlington, Vermont, he was a comparative unknown on the release of his debut album I Looked Out in 2022. All this changed when he finally got on his horse and left the state to tour it, building an audience the old school way by having a shoulder to the wheel and ultimately, a critical groundswell for his unorthodox, distressed alt country.
It’s follow up Burnover spoke to a man refusing to grasp the simple or straightforward angles of his music, which continued to throw up a mutant strain of early Pavement and Silver Jews, or if you’re searching for a more recent parallel, MJ Lenderman. A sometimes nostalgic, sometimes prismatic view of a country rich in history but poor in the memory of it, what appeared to be a risk was instead paid back in spades, lifting the singer into name dropping territory.
All Set The Bone follows a move to Chicago and was recorded in LA with John Congleton, but the veteran producer elects wisely to not give Freeman too much sheen. With added influences into the mix – Fugazi, Mission of Burma, Big Star – it’s all still delightfully ramshackle and the voice is as peculiarly atonal as ever. Indu, opener Cahokia, Untitled 10 and Hail Mary are each however steps forward, while Decade’s satisfyingly honky tonk piano frames the entropy of modern life. Greg Freeman’s put in the miles alright, but the journey’s far from over yet.
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