Draven Reviews - Van Wagner's River Rat

I’d like to preface this review by saying bluegrass, folk, and country aren’t my thing. I’m not a Bob Dylan or Willie Nelson fan, and about as folk as I get in my usual listening is stuff by The Violent Femmes. And I’d also like to say that I won’t be biased, I’ll be pushing my admiration for Mr. Wagner as a teacher as well as an all-around person to the side as much as I’m able to.

River Rat is the newest album by local educator and prolific bluegrass musician Van Wagner. Released in 2017, River Rat is Wagner’s 21st studio album, and clocks in at thirteen tracks that make up a run time of about forty seven minutes. It explores themes such Pennsylvania history, the outdoors, and Wagner’s personal experiences throughout, making for a pretty lyrically-varied record. In this review, I’ll be covering my thoughts on the lyrical content, the musical composition, and the production/engineering.

Now first and foremost, readers should know this isn’t a traditional album in a lyrical sense. Where many artists paint with a broad brush in order to make it easier for their listeners to relate, you can tell Wagner is a true musician in the sense that he makes the music for himself first and foremost. You’ll hear Wagner namedrop many specific places and people that are important to him, some of which you may not understand, but if you’re willing to just come along for the ride through his experiences, you’ll almost feel like you were with him through it all by the album’s end. As a city dweller in the earlier parts of my life, I don’t relate much to the lyrical subject matter in general, but the appeal is definitely there for anyone with an attachment to or history with this region or even the outdoors in general. However, despite my lack of personal attachment to the subjects of the songs, there’s no doubt that the lyrics are extremely well constructed. Across the album’s runtime, Wagner is able to consistently craft vivid imagery that is always beautifully and inventively described, like on “Halo Around the Moon,” where he manages to write about something we experience every year here in Pennsylvania, the four seasons, in a fresh and poetic way. Then, on “Whiskey and Knives,” Wagner exhibits his impeccable ability to tell a story. And while there are many moments where Wagner conjures up vivid images for the sake of making the listener picture them, there are also times where he takes this skill and elevates it by applying it to very personal subjects, like on “Every Single Moment.” On this track, Wagner muses about realizing the weight every second of his life has, and the impact of the decisions he makes on the world around him. My favorite exploration of this concept (though I may be letting my bias show a little) is when he reflects on his teaching career, saying, “I feel it many times in the classroom/Hundreds of students through my door/A piece of my heart goes to each one/And I know there’ll be hundreds more.” It’s through lines like these that Wagner’s passion for not just teaching, but life in general, really shines.

With all of these great lyrics, one might fear they’d be near impossible to do justice vocally. But rest assured, these lyrics are not wasted by the vocal performances by any means. Despite only showcasing a fairly limited range vocally, Wagner’s voice has a wonderfully authentic tone that exudes immense levels of passion and makes him sound wise beyond his years, allowing his sincerity to push to the forefront and elevate the album vocally in many places. While the verses on these tracks are mostly just Wagner’s voice and his guitar, wonderful harmonies complement them and help make for bombastic choruses, filling the gaps where percussion would traditionally be. As such, none of the songs sound incomplete or too skeletal despite their general minimalism, and Wagner’s ability to build to and execute a chorus is admirable given that he has only his guitar and voice (and the occasional vocal or string accompaniment, such as our very own Christina Han’s gorgeous string part on “Scythe”) to work with.

On the musical side, River Rat is almost technically flawless. As a guitarist myself, believe me when I say Wagner’s finger picking and ear for melody is enviable to a point where it almost frustrates me as I still tend to stumble through “Blister in the Sun.” He plays with unbelievable precision, and a lot of the slight inflections that come through in his strumming and picking make his sound truly his own. He plays and sings simultaneously with ease, while implementing some great acoustic licks in between vocal phrases as well. For example, “When It Rains It Pours” exhibits precise and downright beautiful guitar work coupled with an infectious vocal melody and chorus, and “Solstice” is a super cool (albeit short) instrumental featuring mandolin and guitar, with the composition of the mandolin parts almost sounding of another time period altogether. Overall, the music is wonderfully smooth on the ears, and very faithful to the genre, but also manages to be original in more ways than one.

Now, finally, we come to the production and arrangement. The production on River Rat is minimal, but effective, keeping Wagner’s voice and guitar at the front of the mix, with guest vocalists and accompanying instruments mostly just providing support. This is much to the album’s advantage, as Wagner’s performances are magnetic. The mixing is also very clean while not sacrificing the raw quality that’s common with music of this genre, further strengthening the record’s authentic and rustic feel. Another thing many people disregard but is also very important to an album’s success is the arrangement of the tracklist. There’s a great mix of uptempo and slower tracks distributed intelligently throughout the record. Wagner doesn’t frontload the tracklist with upbeat tracks to try to catch and hold your attention for as long as possible as many artists tend to do, instead opting to balance out the album’s slow burners with the more feel-good and upbeat tracks, creating an almost fifty-minute album experience that never drags.

So overall, I don’t have many critiques of this album on a technical level, but rather some suggestions that I think could help expand his sound greatly. On future works, peppering in some light electric blues or slide guitar and atmospheric percussion could really add to the authenticity and create some dynamics, further diversifying his sound while also maintaining its core feel. Also, storytelling and imagery is something Wagner excels at, so I’d like to see him explore that more and perhaps even get more ambitious with it in the future, either by tackling a cohesive narrative (as I mentioned earlier) or by retelling more personal stories from his life for a complete album’s runtime.

But all in all, this album is a super interesting listen, full of great guitar melodies, lyrical gems, and a passion and sincerity that is unfortunately becoming rarer and rarer in music these days. While this style of music may not be my personal favorite, River Rat certainly wasn’t a chore to listen to, and has a lot to love. I’d recommend everyone give it a listen, but wouldn’t promise thorough enjoyment to an everyday listener. The album is pretty dense lyrically, and the music is pretty minimalist, albeit very beautiful, so it may be hard for some to get into. However, to any fans of folk, country, bluegrass, or all three, I can’t recommend this album enough, as it takes everything that makes those genres American staples and combines them into one beautiful, heartwarming package.

Final Score: 7.5/10

Favorite Tracks: “Every Single Moment,” “Halo Around the Moon,” “Solstice,” “When It Rains It Pours,” “Whiskey and Knives”

Least Favorite Track: “Shoestrings and Duct Tape”

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