Songwriter Jesse Passage possesses a brilliant sense of melodic arrangement, which is on full display in his first LP, Hours That Fall. His singing voice is clarion, and his hybrid (flat plectrum/fingerstyle) acoustic guitar picking is second-to-none. Jesse cut his teeth playing some hardscrabble places in South Dearborn Heights and Detroit, persisting on talent, a stubborn integrity, and a wicked sense of humor. It’s deceiving, though, to hear him sing. He has a pretty voice, but his art is not reducible to his vocal ability. For within those dulcet tones and brilliant melodies lie lived wisdom, loss, and pain. These are the elements that lend his lyrics their poignancy and that ultimately set him apart from songwriters whose musical abilities are proficient but who find themselves with little to really say about our short time here. Jesse has been a known entity within the Detroit songwriting community for a good 15 years, but with the release of his latest record, it’d be a crime if he doesn’t become better known outside this region.

Hours That Fall reminds us that friendships and loves are tenuous, but songs we sing about these themes might lend us something that lasts. In this light the song “The Devil In You” makes good sense. If songs are all that last, Passage reasons, then getting those songs into the world is vital work. This ain’t Hollywood, this is real, Passage sings, and I sure ain’t got no picture deal. Being nice is fine, but it ain’t gonna get you far in life; it’s gonna take the devil in you to get you what you need. These lyrics serve as an ethos for someone who, outside of a couple years in Chicago, has lived in an out-of-the-way working class suburb of Detroit. No, South Dearborn Heights, MI isn’t Hollywood, and it does take a certain toughness, or “the devil in you” as Passage would have it, to play live music there, to insist upon playing original songs in places like the Dawg House or Bar 342, but Passage, if he believes in anything, believes in the power of song to speak to lived experience. 

In “Patch Me Up” Passage sings of some of the perils of the singer-songwriter trade, namely pills and booze. At one point in the song, he sardonically delivers the line, I tell my doctor things that I would normally just sing; I’m doing alright, then, when the chorus hits, he asks the listener, Isn’t it sad how some of us will only grow old? It’s an intentionally inscrutable question that engages us in the problematics surrounding the artist’s ability to ameliorate pain through craft, in the tension between what the art demands of us and what our own physical health demands of us. Much hinges on the word “only,” as if there’s another option through making art, a “grow old and…” version that we hope Passage has begun to curate for himself. What’s great about Passage’s approach, though, is that he doesn’t cop out of complexities with cheap affirmation the way many contemporary songwriters do, for, after all, this ain’t Hollywood, this is real. This songwriter captures what’s real without reducing it to a disingenuous pith.

Jesse Passage has lost both his parents, most recently his mother, who spent her career as an English teacher and likely had a hand in Passage’s deft ability to turn a phrase. The specter of his father, who passed away when Passage was in his early 20s and with whom he would listen to old George Jones and Willie Nelson records, looms large in Passage’s oeuvre. Passage actually started playing guitar when he was 22, the year his father died. He writes poignantly, if obliquely, about these losses on this record. Oh dear Lord, when you get bored, won’t you slay me down and let me know I’m real. I’ve been bothered by the death of my father, but I won’t shed a tear for fear of looking weak. When what we’ve lost is put to melody, it doesn’t make the loss any less painful, but it does memorialize it in a way that only great art can. It also lends a sympathy to the songwriter who is brave enough and perhaps alone enough to admit he misses his father. And the reason this sort of thing matters is not that we gain a sightline into the songwriter’s autobiography in any confessional sense but that this tension wrests the songs and their lyrics from the merely relatable and turns them into something akin to myth. 

At eight tracks, there’s no filler on Hours That Fall. These songs, along with producer Garret Schmittling’s production choices, are world class. Musically, the record puts this writer in mind of Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit with the acoustic guitar-driven melodic hooks and the subtle, slightly fuzzed-out phrasings of Schmittling’s electric guitar. The lead track “Restoral” draws us right in and Passage maintains the quality from there. Other standout tracks include “Further From Home,” “Fly Without Wings,” and “Patch Me Up.” His duet with singer Holly Frances (Painted White/Holly & the Johnnies) on “Further From Home” is particularly gorgeous, and Frances also lends key harmonies to the chorus of “Patch Me Up.” The amount of vocal talent on these two tracks is formidably beautiful and, once again, one has to credit Schmittling’s production and arrangement sensibilities here. He really does a phenomenal job of drawing the best from these two vocalists, as well as capturing Passage’s ability to pick a guitar; that Martin dreadnought Passage favors sounds as natural and clear as it does in the living room, a difficult feat in any recording process.

This is all to say that Jesse Passage is a rare talent who has written a group of songs that are built to last. If there is any meritocracy in the contemporary music world, this record will garner some serious attention. 

Jesse Passage, former frontman and chief songwriter of Tiny Water Flea Clocks, is from Dearborn Heights, Michigan. He has been writing and performing original songs for over 20 years throughout the Midwest. His EP One Shot was produced by Leo Papa and released on Cybersong Records in 2017. His first LP, Hours That Fall, was produced by Garrett Schmittling and released on all digital platforms earlier this month.