The Goodnight Loving: Crooked Lake

The Goodnight Loving's Crooked Lake comes with a great back story: After recording its 2006 debut Cemetery Trails with hero Greg Cartwright of Reigning Sound and Oblivians, the Milwaukee band holed up for a weekend with some recording equipment at band member Andy Kavanaugh's cabin in Wisconsin's idyllic north woods and wound up with another record. Like Bob Dylan and The Band's The Basement Tapes—another collection of songs recorded by buddies just hanging out—Crooked Lake is a ragged, spirited collection that touches on a variety of rock, pop, folk, country, and blues styles. Some performances are perhaps too ragged—the potentially great rocker "My Important Heart" could've used a second take—but the rush of heartfelt passion pouring from songs like "Another Foggy Yesterday" and "Latter 20th Century Apocalyptic Blues" makes up for the lack of polish.