Cass McCombs is an open secret, an enigma laid bare. His talents have long been recognised by critics and peers: just ask any one of the impressive list of acts he has toured with over the last couple of decades. If you’re good enough for the Meat Puppets, Beth Gibbons or Beach House, then you’re clearly doing something right. But there remains something of the outsider about him. When mainstream success follows critical acclaim, we are tempted to see it as causation rather than correlation, but that’s not always the case, and McCombs is the proof. He’s like that horse you put money on coming up to win in the final furlong, only he threw his rider at the first fence. There are plenty out there, songwriters doing their own thing, not getting quite the attention they deserve, maybe relieved to be out of the limelight. But few are as prolific or as talented as McCombs, and Interior Live Oak – his eleventh solo album – sees him back on the Domino roster and in predictably fine form.
It’s sometimes hard to pinpoint exactly what it is that McCombs does: his songs skirt folk, psych, country, blues, desert rock and pop, but never set up camp for too long in any one place. His songs can be quirky or literary, but he is less self-consciously quirky than, say, Andrew Bird, less inclined to court the literary tastes of listeners than MJ Lenderman (another tour mate). Interior Live Oak’s lead single Peace is a fluid piece of North African-inspired folk-rock dovetailed with a winning soft rock melody. Lindsey Buckingham jamming in the dunes.
The secret is in the songcraft. The clues are there in Priestess, a song for a departed friend: a reference to John Prine is particularly telling, not because McCombs’ songs resemble Prine’s in any superficial sense, but because they share an easily-worn, hard-won maturity. Neither Prine nor McCombs ever set out to please anyone. The songs are the songs; they are worth your time, but they’re not going to beg you to listen to them.
There is a low-lit California haze, detectable in the organ that underpins parts of Priestess, that permeates much of Interior Live Oak, and gives it the feel of a homecoming. It’s a feeling strengthened in Home At Last, a loping acoustic ballad full of self-deprecating wit. The gentle, folky Missionary Bell is imbued with warmth, like some of Bob Dylan’s gentler songs from the New Morning era. Here, McCombs’ voice is foregrounded, but unlike Dylan’s, it doesn’t strain or contort. It’s a lesson in being easy and welcoming without being bland. But he can get crunchy too: witness the tactile guitar chug of Miss Mabee, or the strung-out, wiry new-wave of Juvenile, which has elements of the Modern Lovers, the Attractions and even Devo. Similarly, Asphodel is almost Strokes-like in its cool simplicity, albeit with hints of power pop, Tom Petty and the Beatles.
The epic Lola Montez Danced the Spider Dance – a good companion-piece to Joanna Newsom’s song on the same theme – has an inevitable somnambulant creep. The bluesy slow-burn of I’m Not Ashamed is accompanied by imagistic lyrics, Diamond’s In the Mine has a music-box prettiness, and Who Closed the Cellar Door shuffles darkly, dabbling in American gothic hinterlands and sprinkling swirls of organ here and there, like a spooked Garth Hudson. As a whole, the collection hits the sweet spot between concision and variation with admirable regularity.
McCombs has an innate ability to pace a song perfectly. A Girl Named Dogie spins itself out delectably, a dark bar-room blues that blossoms halfway through with an unexpected and blistering guitar solo and packs in some faux-yodelling for good measure. I Never Dream About Trains is a loping piano ballad, sunbaked and homesick, sticking just the right side of nostalgia. It hangs around just long enough to tell its story without oversharing: there always seems to be something left unsaid in these songs, a welcome element of mystery. That mystery is there too in Van Wyck Expressway, with its amnesiac lyrics and wild, lonesome steel guitar, and on the chiaroscuro tones of the jazz-inflected Strawberry Moon.
Alongside regular collaborators Matt Sweeney and Mike Bones, and in keeping with the album’s themes of return and homecoming, McCombs also joined forces with former collaborators Jason Quever and Chris Cohen, who, between them, provide musical backing, production and mixing. The result is one of his strongest collections of songs. As the album throbs to a thrilling close with the distorted guitar psych of the title track, you are left feeling both satisfied and beguiled, hoping that this might be the one that gets McCombs the broader recognition he deserves.
Interior Live Oak (August 15th, 2025) Domino Records
Pre-Order/Pre-Save: https://cassmccombs.ffm.to/interiorliveoak
Cass McCombs Tour Dates
Wed. Aug. 13 – Porto, PT @ Paredes de Coura ^
Sat. Aug. 17 – Crickhowell, UK @ Green Man Festival ^
Tue. Aug. 19 – Bristol, UK @Lantern Hall ^
Wed. Aug. 20 – London, UK @Bush Hall ^
Thu. Aug. 21 – Manchester, UK @ YES ^
Sat. Aug. 23 – Galway, IE @ Leisureland * %
Sun. Aug. 24 – Dublin, IE @ Wider Than Pictures Festival * %
Mon. Aug. 25 – Belfast, IE @ Ulster Hall * %
Tue. Aug. 26 – Cork, IE @ City Hall * %
Thu. Aug. 28 – Glasgow, SCT @ Barrowland * %
Fri. Aug. 29 – Glasgow, SCT @ Barrowland * %
Wed. Sept. 10 – San Diego, CA @The Casbah ^
Thu. Sept. 11 – Los Angeles, CA @ Shrine Expo Hall & ^
Fri. Sept. 12 – Riverside, CA @Farmhouse ^
Sat. Oct. 11 – Maspeth, NY @ Knockdown Center #
* with Father John Misty
& with MJ Lenderman, Nap Eyes
# with Destroyer
% Solo
^ Full Band Performance