Cash Langdon’s new record Dogs kicks off with two sounds: a droning guitar, and a train whistle. When I hear it for the first time, I pause to make sure the train is in the recording. Having spent some time with Langdon, I have a feeling that it is. He’s a close listener – the kind of person nothing is lost on. It’s something you can hear in the observational lyrics of his last record, 2022’s Sinister Feeling; but on its follow-up, Dogs, you can also hear it in the camaraderie he cultivates playing live with his band, a sonic energy that gives off the heat of his native Birmingham.

The train is on the track. Other whirring sounds drift in and out of the opening title track for a minute, like a mower sputtering up to a start. Then Meadow Dust (Langdon’s longtime friends from Birmingham’s DIY scene, drummer Reagan Bruce and bassist Matt Whitson) drop into a crunchy, hypnotic groove. Their fuzzy take on heavy country rock has a worn-in no-fussiness that recalls Neil Young & Crazy Horse – nothing overthought, nothing understated. And like Young, Karen Dalton, or more recently, Cass McCombs – Langdon’s voice is simultaneously earnest and world-weary. Maybe it’s a weariness that comes with his penchant for noticing things: Won’t see the moon tonight / Pollution covers the skies. But there’s a sense of humor, too, and a resignation to keeping on: “Taking the great unknown / Turn it into a favor.” This theme thrums throughout the record – that somewhere in the grind there lies an opportunity for alchemy.

Released May 2nd via Seasick Records/Well Kept Secret, Dogs is available here on limited edition ‘notebook yellow’ colored vinyl and CD.