If you’re searching for insights into the state of the human condition in 2025, look no further than Puff of Smoke (Honey Jar/Thirty Tigers), the highly-anticipated ninth album of original music from Grammy-nominated progressive Americana trio The Wood Brothers.
Less a literal soundtrack to uncertain times or a roadmap showing how to live through them, Puff of Smoke posits a happily contrarian outlook: Life can turn on a dime, and all we truly have is the moment at hand. And that’s perfectly fine. “We’re not in control,” says guitarist, vocalist and songwriter Oliver Wood, “and that can be good news.”
Between the poetic observations of Oliver and his brother, bassist and vocalist Chris Wood — with percussionist and multi-instrumentalist Jano Rix completing the trio — Puff of Smoke is an 11-song collection brimming with joy in the face of challenges, delivering lyrical wisdom with the winking subtlety of John Prine and the musical hive mind of a seasoned group with two decades of shared experiences.
Fans who have hopped aboard at waypoints along the journey that began with their now classic 2006 debut Ways Not to Lose already know to expect a new drop from The Wood Brothers will bring inventive songwriting, a grounded lyrical wit, and an adventurous sweep of sonic avenues. Unpredictability is part of the listening experience.
“This album is a little bit schizophrenic and eclectic, and it goes in a few different directions,” says Oliver.
“There’s a lot to unpack musically in this band, and it’s been this evolutionary process over the years and on each record,” Chris continues. “Over time, the diversity of things we can do has all become part of our language.”
Largely recorded at The Studio Nashville, a creative space in the Sylvan Heights neighborhood that has become an essential companion to the band’s evolution, Puff of Smoke distills the trio’s curious musical minds, voracious appetite for the creative process, and love of spontaneity.
“When you’re writing or performing, the hope is that your subconscious handles everything and your conscious, thinking, judging mind gets out of the way,” Chris says. “Because your subconscious is the most true, authentic piece of you. You’re not judging yourself when your subconscious is speaking. That’s how the best art comes about.”
Always looking to find new sounds to express in their music, the album’s opening track “Witness” dives deeper than ever into the pan-American songbook for inspiration, garnishing its groove with blasts of back-alley New Orleans brass. On “The Trick,” Jano found the song’s signature sound, an overdriven synth that sounds like it could be Clavinet, but is actually a Fender Rhodes pushed through distortion and octave pedals. He also manipulated an analog synth to conjure the underwater-calliope sounds on “Above All Others.” To perform the piano’s centerpiece melody on “Pray God Listens,” he played keys with one hand while reaching inside the piano with his other hand to mute the strings.
“What’s really fun about making a record with this band is that we actually have no idea how we’re going to arrange a song, or what instruments we’re going to play, when we get to a recording session,” says Chris, whose years as a member of Medeski, Martin and Wood primed him for the ego-stripped musical collaborations that are a hallmark of The Wood Brothers. “That’s why first takes are often the best. You don’t have any ideas about the song yet.”
With only a general idea of the song structures — often limited to lyrics and basic chords — their improvisational recording process yielded plenty of first-take gold. The loose, front-stoop feel of “Slow Rise (To the Middle)” and “You Choose Me” are genuine; the final versions that made the album were actually the first times the trio played them together in full. As the band was working out the arrangements for the Cachito-Cuban groove of “Pray God Listens,” with all its Tom Waits whimsy, and the rolling, brass-accented “Witness,” co-producer Brook Sutton liked what he heard so much, he simply brought the microphones to them, not wanting to disturb any piece of the puzzle.
The group also finds inspiration in a shared focus on meditation and mindfulness. “Ways not to go crazy, basically,” Oliver admits. “Songs like ‘The Trick’ and even ‘Puff of Smoke’ and ‘Witness’ are very much about mindfulness,” he says. “‘The trick is not to give a damn’ — so, that’s detachment — or, ‘I’m just a witness’ — I’m just watching things happen. I’m not gonna be my feelings. I’m gonna watch ’em float by.
“Even a song like ‘Pray God Listens,’ which is a little bit humorous and cynical, ultimately it’s a song of compassion and humility,” Oliver says. “It’s meant to be light, but it’s ambiguous enough that you can draw your own conclusion. You can take the cynicism part and the humor, or you can go a little deeper and find the compassion.”
Puff of Smoke is a reminder that life is both precious and precarious — a sentiment underscored by our current geopolitical moment and the unpredictable nature of life itself — and The Wood Brothers invite you to join the ride.
“Creativity is a winding road, not a straight path,” Jano says, before adding the essential caveat at the heart of the group’s ethos: “If you’re open to it.”
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