Neilson Hubbard - Cumberland Island (2018)

While usually found behind the studio desk in his role as one of the most in-demand producers in Nashville, as well as being a songwriter Neilson Hubbard also has a career as a recording artist in his own right, having released six solo albums. That said, other than his input as part of The Orphan Brigade (from whom a new album is due next year), he’s not exactly been prolific of late, this being his first since 2013.

Not only does it continue his co-production collaboration with Ben Glover that began with the latter’s The Emigrant album, but I was also struck by just how much his intimate, hushed and peaty vocals resemble Glover’s, to the point that I had to check the credits. Glover does feature, but only on acoustic guitar, although he does share songwriting credits on four numbers, among them Hubbard’s version of the achingly sublime world-weary How Much Longer Can We Bend? here with a muted fairground intro and featuring Danny Mitchell on piano and Eamon McLoughlin on violin.

The set opens with the piano and violin accompanied, strummed title track, another Glover co-write, a musical memory of Hubbard and his wife Audrey’s 2016 honeymoon on the rugged island off the Georgia coast famed for its ruined castle and wild horses, the feral descendants of those brought by the Spanish Conquistadors in the 16th century. Whether it’s Glover’s input or not, the track has a strong Irish soul air, soaring toward the end in classic Van Morrison style.

Indeed, much the material here has its inspiration in Hubbard’s marriage, the near-whispered confessional piano ballad My Heart Belongs To You (co-penned by Glover and Jude Johnston) with its warm brass in the ebbing moments, For My Love, again featuring co-writer Mitchell on piano, or the emotional rescue of Save You, a co-write with Matthew Perryman Jones.

Indeed, there a recurring theme of salvation running through the songs, most notably epitomised in the sparse, slow waltz Don’t Make Me Walk Through This World Alone (“Make me a garden with the seeds that you sow”) but also on Let It Bleed on which, sharing writing credits with his wife, the light to his spark, he pleads “Please Come back to me.”

While all these, along with the keening, horns washed Can’t Look Away, are all quiet, reflective moments, the album does have its more uptempo side, the first instance being the jaunty Americana jog of If The Sun Comes Up Tomorrow (another song about love being the anchor) with its catchy, tambourine shaking chorus and, the fourth Glover co-write, the upbeat rockabilly Southern-fried chug of That Was Then with Joshua Britt on reso mandolin and Will Kimbrough on electric guitar.

Those southern flavours, a mingling of dust and soul, also provide the marinade for the best number not sharing a Glover credit. A southern folk spiritual about seeking redemption and rebirth, co-written by Alabama-born singer-songwriter Hannah Miller, Oh Black River originally appeared (without the ‘h’) on her 2011 mini-album of the same name, Hubbard’s version losing the trumpet, but providing a platform for some terrific fiddle work by McLoughlin who sees the track out in style.

As a producer, Hubbard has been attached to some of the finest Americana albums of the past decade, most recently Mary Gauthier’s Rifles and Rosary Beads. He can now add his own to that list.