For those unaware, noted Americana singer-songwriter Roger Street Friedman has announced the release of a new album, Love Hope Trust, due on November 4th, 2022.

The album was produced by Grammy-winner Larry Campbell and boasts performances from Jason Crosby on keyboards, Teresa Williams and Lucy Kaplansky on background vocals, and a cameo from legendary accordionist Gil Goldstein.

“This album encompasses a myriad of concerns, fears, joys and sorrows inherent in everyday life in this crazy world from the perspective of age—dare I say maturity—and gratitude,” Friedman asserts.

“I strive to get to emotional truths in my songwriting where people say, ‘oh yeah, I’ve experienced that,’ or just to make people feel something, sadness, joy or longing. That is what makes an album of mine feel successful.”

The album’s producer, Campbell, expressed excitement about the forthcoming record. He shared, “Making this record with Roger Street Friedman was one of the most fulfilling experiences I’ve had as a producer,” Campbell proclaimed. “Great songs, well-crafted lyrics and melodies, vibrant performances, and the creative inspiration that sprang from that made it a joy to show up at the studio every day.”

1. Love Hope Trust
2. Mother And Son
3. Thankful For This Day
4. Vapor In The Air
5. About You
6. In The Summertime
7. The Ghosts Of Sugarland
8. Annabelle
9. Multiply By Two
10. I Want Her To Know
11. Walls Close In
12. Cut Your Losses

This opulently sculptured album of musical gems from start to finish opens on the titular, blues and soul-infused, forward messaging, mid-tempo rocker Love Hope Trust and then comes the aged-to-perfection, troubadour-imbued storytelling within Mother And Son and then we are treated to the veritably shimmering, Gospel-esque, layered melodies within the symbolically beautiful Thankful For This Day, the Caribbean-imbued sweetness within Vapor In The Air, the mid-tempo, Mellencamp-esque rock of About You, and then we get the rhythmically drum-veined In The Summertime.

Up next is the banjo-soaked, rhythmically infectious foot-tapper The Ghosts Of Sugarland, before my own personal, resonant favorite from this album comes to the fore in the simply beautiful Annabelle and they are in turn followed by the Summer’s breeze of Multiply By Two, the low slung Americana plea within I Want Her To Know, the album rounding out on the barn yard, dance floor swirl of Walls Close In, coming to an all too soon close on the tuneful Americana of Cut Your Losses.

Furthering a multi-album artistic continuum between Roger and Larry, the 12-song Love Hope Trust is a sonic scrapbook that documents a divided world while exploring intimately personal journeys that evince universal truths, sensitively snap shooting moments of modern living.

A critically-acclaimed artist whose work has been featured everywhere from American Songwriter and Consequence to No Depression and The Boot, Roger’s insightful lyrics and empathic perspective reveal the magic in the mundane aspects of everyday living.

His songs venture down those dirt roads of folk, country, vintage rock n’ roll, and blues. Love Hope Trust, in particular, is inspired by 1970s folk-rock artists such as Cat Stevens and Jackson Browne.

Furthermore, the material on Love Hope Trust was culled from a collection of songs Roger wrote during the pandemic and onward. The title track opens the record with a lone roots-rock shuffle riff played on an acoustic guitar.

Then, as if a camera pans to a widescreen shot, the full band enters with a nuanced rhythm section groove, and Larry Campbell’s elegant, rockabilly-esque lead guitar figures, and Jason Crosby’s organ fills weaving in and out.

Down the center, Roger’s vocals cut through, rhythmic yet melodic, stating the facts of this frightening time while also dishing out some hope. He sings: Let’s go back to the beginning/Time to pay some rent/all this time we’ve been moving/Hard to believe where we went/Troubled hearts and spinning wheels/Trouble blowin’ out and in/The butterflies in my stomach/Wonder when this too shall end.

Love Hope Trust is the fourth installment in a second chance-era of musicality. Roger left music behind for 25 years before resurfacing with his acclaimed 2014 debut, The Waiting Sky. He returned to music after experiencing a series of seismic life changes, including the deaths of his father and mother, marriage and, later, the births of his two children.

Today, with a well-received album catalog, an engaged fan base, and a lot of road work under his belt, Roger has created a robust and respected artist profile. “I feel like I’m on the right path, and I’m still growing. I think it took me longer to get smart enough to write these songs,” he says with a good natured laugh. “Now, I get to make up for lost time, and I am really lucky because I don’t have a lack of inspiration—something always comes to me when I sit down with my guitar.”

Roger Street Friedman - Love Hope Trust (Official Music Video)

Roger Street Friedman - Annabelle (Official Lyric Video)

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