The Man Who Fell From Earth

Anders Parker’s reputation as a versatile songwriter is safe with the release of his eighth studio album, The Man Who Fell From Earth. Continuing a pattern of unabashedly honest Americana, the first single, “I Don’t Do That Anymore,” is less a shedding of past regrets, and more a dissertation on a life spent rambling. “Skin on Skin” finds Parker at his most progressive, blending a trippy lap-steel against strings and a driving chord progression. The title track floats on a fever dream of cosmic folk, with Parker’s outermost lyrical fancies exposing themselves in concepts of spacey life/loss. On “As the Stars Fell Down on Me,” Parker sings: “You might be feeling bamboozled/I know you’re flying free/but you were there as the stars fell down on me.” It’s these lines that lend credence to the oft-cited “heartfelt” nature of Parker’s work, and provide a proper vessel through which to inject the album’s most diversifying element: the refined melodic interplay of a talented string trio.