Wartime Lovesong (Jericho Beach Music)

Tracing a multigenerational arc from a deeply personal starting point, Wartime Lovesong is an ambitious effort both thematically and sonically. Singer and lyricist Corbin Murdoch starts the title track by singing, “My grandmother/Never talks of love/Without first mentioning the war/The great fable that she built her life upon.”

Those lines neatly sum up what I take to be the theme of the record: the search for something meaningful to believe in, some defining narrative upon which to base one’s own story. The figures who populate these songs (specifically, Murdoch, his grandmother, and his sister) look for truth in the aimless travels of privileged youth, revolutionary slogans and anthems, and acts of service to God and country and one’s fellow humans. Murdoch is smart enough not to tell us whether they find what they’re seeking.

The Nautical Miles’ sound is based in folk and country, but the arrangements here are enlivened by a horn section and the ingenious use of rhythms that shift to underline the lyrical motifs. “Wandering Time” is particularly impressive, as it starts out as churning, steel-guitar-driven alt-twang before morphing into a brassy march. It’s brilliant, and its epic sweep mirrors that of the album as a whole.