ALBUM REVIEW: Will Hoge Gives Songwriting the Spotlight on ‘Tenderhearted Boys’

Teenagers are basically just giant toddlers.

Usually we say this with a chuckle. It helps us wrap our heads around the baffling, illogical things teenagers say and do (or forget to do … ). Will Hoge, however, sees the toddler sweetness in his teenaged sons. On “Tenderhearted Boys,” the title track of Hoge’s latest LP, he hopes they carry it with them through their lives — even if the world around them tries to harden them instead.

“Promise me you’ll be tenderhearted boys,” he sings.

Nashville songwriter Hoge is an emotionally attuned and politically charged Americana songwriter, like the middle ground between Jason Isbell and Joe Strummer. Hoge has a gift for words and melody and a predilection for rocking out. Yet sometimes his songwriting gets lost in the clutter of distorted guitar and driving drums. Tenderhearted Boys, however, reveals a stripped-down Hoge. On the self-produced record, on which Hoge plays every instrument, the songwriting is front and center, couched in only enough instrumentation to serve each tune.

Like a tomato sandwich, which is perfect with exactly four ingredients, less is more on Tenderhearted Boys.

“Some people say beggars can’t be choosers / well I guess they never had to ask for much,” Hoge sings on “Some People.” “The difference between the winners and the losers / depends on where some people started from.” It’s a jangly anti-folk number: there’s no hiding the social critiques and it’s easy to sing along or add new verses.

Will Hoge (photo by Kate Kauss)

One of two Springsteen-style numbers on Tenderhearted Boys (“I Still Got It” is about a Cadillac … ), “My Daddy’s Eyes” patiently tells the story of a working-class family in a cycle of poverty and debt. “My dad worked at the power plant / his dad did too,” Hoge sings. “I got a job here working third shift / soon as I finished high school.” When the family escapes, it’s not to wealth, but to a job with a little more dignity.

Hoge showcases his mastery of the country hook on “I’d Be Lying,” while familiar idioms become political double entendres on folk-rocker “Accountable.” “Family barely holding it together,” he sings, “The elephant just gets bigger.” On “Good While it Lasted,” Hoge covers Hayes Carll, a fellow word- and melody-smith who knows when to rock out and when to fingerpick a broken-in old Gibson.

Perhaps that is where Hoge, too, has arrived.

Will Hoge’s Tenderhearted Boys is out April 12 on EDLO Records/Soundly Music.