While Country Artists Increasingly Turn Toward Making Lengthy, Often Double Albums, Kip Moore Prefers Quality Over Quantity
The “Somethin’ ’Bout a Truck” hitmaker follows the three-year absence since 2020’s acclaimed Wild World with a tight, focused collection that showcases his greatest strength: his gritty, emotive voice. Damn Love opens with its title track, a heartland rocker with country flourishes that considers romantic love as a double-edged sword, a theme that recurs across the rest of the record.
“The Guitar Slinger” is something of a centerpiece for Damn Love, as the six-minute opus chronicles the “highs and lows of a sad song singer,” offering a glimpse into the less glamorous side of Moore’s life as a touring musician. Sonically, the track is especially spare, eventually building to one of Moore’s most powerful vocal performances to date. The production on Damn Love is noteworthy, too, as Moore co-produced the LP with The Cadillac Three’s Jaren Johnston, the latter having a penchant for crunchy, often funk-influenced arrangements. That fusion is especially evident on tracks like the Springsteen-esque “Heart on Fire,” with its funky, staccato guitar, and the twangy groove of “Kinda Bar.”
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