Benji

Folk singer Mark Kozelek's remarkable sixth album as Sun Kil Moon feels less like a collection of songs than a series of eulogies delivered in real time. "Carissa was 35/You don't just raise two kids and take out your trash and die," he protests – then admits he didn't know Carissa all that well, anyway. It's a casually devastating line on an album filled with them. Later, thoughts on lost love and attempted suicide detour to Panera Bread, and a midnight show of Led Zeppelin's The Song Remains the Same becomes a soul-splitting apology to a kid Kozelek bullied in grade school. Small becomes big and big gets swallowed up by time. But Kozelek's digressions aren't dismissals of tragedy; they're reminders that life is too rich to be defined by it.