First Listen: Adam Arcuragi - Like A Fire That Consumes All Before It... (album stream)

With his fiery rock and rousing choruses, Arcuragi crafts songs of community, with music that binds. It's all so full of soul, so unadorned; it's a sound that always feels as if it's reaching toward the sky.

'Like A Fire That Consumes All Before It...' will be released Jan. 31.


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Review by Bob Boilen for NPR.org.

I remember going to an Adam Arcuragi concert at SXSW last year. It was a small club, but packed; most of the people around me had never heard of him. But that didn't stop any of us from spontaneously singing, unprompted, the choruses to his songs — songs we'd mostly never heard before. It's easy to imagine: Just listen to "Oh I See"; there's something so primal about what Arcuragi does.

This isn't groundbreaking music: You can hear Bruce Springsteen here, 16 Horsepower there, and some dark, gospel-infused folk along the way. But it's all so full of soul, so unadorned; it's a sound that always feels as if it's reaching toward the sky. The music seems bigger than it is.

Out Jan. 31, Like a Fire That Consumes All Before It... is Arcuragi's third full-length album and, like 2009's I Am Become Joy, it features his fine band The Lupine Chorale Society. I've heard Arcuragi refer to this music as "Death Gospel" — a term that certainly implies darkness — but a passionate infusion of Southern roots music helps make Like a Fire seem lighter than expected. With his poetic preaching and rousing choruses, Arcuragi crafts songs of community, with music that binds.

Review by Bob Boilen for NPR.org. Please visit that link to show your appreciation and to support them and/or to stream track by track.

Links
http://www.adamarcuragi.com
http://www.facebook.com/adamarcuragi
http://twitter.com/Adamarcuragi
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Arcuragi