Son Volt Preps Politically Charged New Album Union

Son Volt, the evolving alt.country project of Jay Farrar, will return March 29 with a politically charged album called Union.

“There are so many forces driving our country apart,” Farrar said in a press statement accompanying the announcement. “What can we do to bring our society back together?”

Four of the album’s 13 songs were recorded at the Woody Guthrie Center in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Guthrie, whom Farrar has channeled and honored before on the albums New Multitudes and Okemah and the Melody of Riot, serves as a guiding light on Union. Woody’s classic tune “Deportees (Plane Wreck At Los Gatos)” is said to be the inspiration for the album’s closing track, “The Symbol.”

Union also tips its hat to labor and community organizer Mary “Mother Jones” Harris, as three of the album’s cuts were tracked at the Mother Jones Museum in Mount Olive, Illinois.

In addition to Farrar (guitar, vocals), Son Volt’s lineup includes Mark Spencer (piano, organ, acoustic slide, lap steel, backing vocals) Andrew DuPlantis (bass, backing vocals), Chris Frame (guitar), and Mark Patterson (drums, percussion).

The album will be released on Transmit Sound/Thirty Tigers.