Ken Cormier is the indie-rock equivalent of a comet with an uncertain orbit: you never know when he’s going to return, but it’s always cause for wonderment when he does. His latest is no exception. “Old King Cloud” is the Connecticut musician’s first album since “Nowhere Is Nowhere” in 2009, which was the follow-up to his 2002 debut, “Radio Bueno.”
Where his earlier work was experimental and occasionally downright (and gloriously) weird — see “Fum Fum” from “Nowhere Is Nowhere” — his new album shifts the balance more toward melody on 10 indelible indie-pop songs, sometimes with an idiosyncratic bent. Yet for every flash of eccentricity on “Old King Cloud” there’s an undercurrent of poignancy, like the feeling of absence that lingers after a beloved guest has visited and then departed. That’s probably not far off the mark: Cormier dedicated the album to his brother, Bobby, who died unexpectedly in 2019 at the age of 55.
At least some of “Old King Cloud” sounds like Cormier is saying goodbye. “Song from the Grave” is a compassionate requiem as Cormier sings softly over fingerpicked acoustic guitar and resonant piano, while “Nineteen Eighty-Five” is steeped in nostalgia. Cormier’s lyrics are sometimes pointed — “We get stuck in the past / And the future doesn’t last,” he sings, his vocal melody rising and falling through an arrangement of resonant piano doubled by acoustic guitar — but he sounds almost bemused at how getting older affects the way we see our younger selves.
Though it has sorrowful moments, “Old King Cloud” isn’t forlorn. More than anything, the album is a showcase for Cormier’s smart lyricism and his pop instincts, on songs he wrote and played himself. Musical textures hold sway on some tunes, like the scabrous electric guitar riff that carries opener “I’m Yours,” or the lilting calliope feel of “Almost Gone,” which adds and subtracts tinkling piano, acoustic guitar and layers of vocals. Cormier is an English professor and poet when he’s not making music, so it’s no surprise that his lyrics sit at the fore of other songs. He has an innate feel for words, the way they fit together and the effect they can have. His lyrical sensibility is especially rewarding on “Trash Man.” Over organ, guitar and piano, Cormier sings about a guy who contains multitudes, and the shape and meter of the words is as bright and vivid as the images they evoke: “He was a labor mediator for the ladies in the factory,” Cormier sings, and it’s a sublime pleasure to roll that line around on your tongue.
Cormier lets his off-kilter side run free on “Kitchen Sink,” a manic ditty that is at once the catchiest and quirkiest song on the album. Opening with a beat that will make your hips twitch, Cormier adds staccato guitar, a ponging organ and, on the instrumental breaks, breathy, wordless vocals that sound like a chorus of sing-song leprechauns on a sugar high. He delivers the lyrics in a conversational tone, shifting perspectives and locations like a fast-moving dream. “Now / I’m in the clouds / I’m in the atmosphere / Don’t ask me how,” he sings, and of course you won’t ask, because this particular fast-moving dream, if that’s what it is, is too engrossing to risk waking up in the middle.
If “Kitchen Sink” is peak Cormier, with its candy-colored hooks and jittery energy, the title track isn’t far behind, for different reasons. The song is essentially one long refrain, with Cormier repeating the title over and over, his vocals double-tracked as he accompanies himself with rolling piano chords and acoustic guitar. The song sounds like Cormier recorded it using a room mic that captured the piano and his vocals at once, and the lo-fi feel, combined with his full-throated singing and the lyrical repetition, creates a sense of catharsis that falls just short of overwhelming, thanks to tension-cutting hooting and nonsense vocals that come between verses.
Some musicians sound rusty when they return after a long absence, as if their skills have gone slack from disuse. Not Cormier. Though it’s been almost 11 years since his previous album, “Old King Cloud” is so well written, and tightly performed, that it’s probably safe to assume Cormier never stopped revising and refining until he got everything exactly right.