“Cairn” means a pile of stones, to signify a memorial, mark a trail, or convey “I was here.” It is also the name of the new Chris Pellnat album, released March 6, 2024.
Cairn is a “singer-songwriter” album broadly but delves into other instrumental choices and textures, and includes some psychedelia and straight-up folk rock. Cairn was two years in the making and reflects a search for safe haven and normalcy amid the insanity of world events.
Since this music is acoustic guitar-driven mostly and falls under the "folk" genre, I began with a question: What is folk music anyway? Children's playground rhymes and counting games are a good example of true folk music: passed on and evolving from generation to generation with no recordings, videos, algorithms or social media influencers.
For example, "Eenie meenie miney moe" or "Miss Mary Mack, Mack Mack" or "Inka binka ball of ink..."
I used the latter as the lyrical starting point for "Ship on the Horizon," the first song on the album, Cairn.
"Ship on the Horizon" has a rustic, clear sound with dulcimer and upright bass, out-of-sync with the trend of many of the polished, overproduced pop "folk" songs we hear today. The rest of the album has equally rustic acoustic songs - but also electric sounds and even some synthesizers - so I am not such a purist after all. Just striving for something real, using the tools at hand.
Let's walk through the songs, shall we?
"Ship on the Horizon" begins the album with the sound of the ocean, which harmonizes with the album cover image of a cairn on the Maine coastline. The first words in the lyrics are "Inka bank ball of ink" = which is a children's playground rhyme. That is truly "folk" music because children's rhymes are passed on from generation to generation with no recordings, videos, algorithms or social media influencers. "Ship on the Horizon" has a rustic, clear sound with dulcimer and upright bass, out-of-sync with the trend of many of the polished, overproduced pop "folk" songs we hear today.
"Wandering Squandering" is a folk-rock song with some retro synths that add an interesting vibe, I think. The song is about the passage of time, missed changes and regrets. But it's still optimistic and lighthearted in the "na na na na na..." passages especially.
"Forest Giants" is perhaps the most experimental song on the album. There's an acoustic guitar there so you could still consider it a "singer-songwriter" song but the creepy laughter and grinding synthesizers give it an otherworldly feeling, inspired by the woods. I'm not a big fan of autotune, but for this song it worked so I used it in an obvious way, clearly an intentional artistic choice.
"The World Won't Let Me Believe" is an anthem that basically says: The world keeps telling me things are bad, but I don't listen to the world. I know we will rise above all the evil in the word because most people are good and they want to leave the world better than it was when they came into it.
"Better" is a straight ahead folk rock song in which the singer admits he's less than perfect, but is on the road to recovery and is becoming "better." The message is: don't judge me for things that I've done. I'm better than those things I've done and just watch me do better things in the future.
"Maddening Muse" is an acoustic song about artistic inspiration. The singer is speaking to his muse, saddened that the muse only appears sometimes and disappears unexpectedly. Inspiration cannot be forced and we cannot depend on the muse visiting use when we wish. So as an artist you need to practice and stay ready and vigilant so when the muse visits, you can gather the inspiration and put it to good use.
"Dragonflies" uses an organ and a Rickenbacker guitar to drive kinetic energy over a drum loop. The result is interesting, I think, and the lyrics are simple, yet mysterious. "Dragonflies by day, fireflies by night."
"After Everything That You've Done" Some people leave destruction in their wake, wherever they go. This song is about such a person and asks the person to "leave the stage" of life to stop further chaos.
"Child's Play" is a Rickenbacker-driven jangle folk rock song written from the perspective of someone who considers themselves to be "above" things and other people. The paradox of the song is that the listener can't tell if t7he singer is justified in asserting that everything is :child's play,"
"The Final Wager" I concluded the album with a very happy, jaunty song. It's actually a rather silly song, but I wanted to end on a light note.