Old Stock, Ben Caplan’s new album, is the equivalent of a one-man, off-Broadway musical bender; it’s equal parts political satire and reinvention of old-world musical storytelling.
The album is based on the play Old Stock: A Refugee Love Story, which was written collaboratively by Christian Barry and Hannah Moscovitch and traces the arc of a pastiche of folk narratives inspired by the musical traditions of the Jewish diaspora and the true story of two Romanian immigrants. It follows its protagonists as they find themselves in the various roles, including young lovers, unhappy spouses, castaways and mourners. Switching gears from soliloquy to song without look-back, Old Stock is a mini-musical odyssey, operating in an enviable mix of acerbity and raunch and dispensing cogent and biting observations of religious irony and critical social issues.
The vocals are crystal clear and the bass in Caplan’s pronunciations booms with a stirring force while the instrumentation, deft and explosive, shifts with lilting poise and zig-zaging attack. “Plough the Shit” rips with a crescendoing energy that practically spits itself out at the listener’s ears, and “Happy People” moves with the buoyant electricity of any traditional Klezmer number. “Lullaby,” on the other hand, channels a sweetness and sadness reminiscent of the earlier slow numbers of Tom Waits.
The lyrical regard is at certain times coy and nearly impish while at others startlingly immediate and affecting, proceeding through wordplay, jest and true seriousness with articulate drive and uncanny swagger. In Caplan’s inimitable ability to blend severity and humour (“you fell out of your mother on the right side of the border”), “The Traveler’s Curse” examines the hardships faced by immigrants while speaking of the effects of anomie and displacement. Inevitably, it draws parallels to the current refugee crisis facing the world and the border tensions of Trump’s America.
In this sense, Old Stock uses the lens of the history of Jewish displacement as both a point of study and departure for current issues of xenophobia, sexual politics and colonial legacy. In so much, it is not only historicizing one ethno-religious group, or one story of persecution, but in fact providing a thematic duality that undergirds and illuminates a broader understanding of many of the cultural and political issues that affect the globe over. Through its exploration of sexual norms, taboos and consent on “Minimum Intervals” or its evocation of colonial bias on “Widow Bride,” Old Stock offers a case study that is specific with a subject matter that is both vital and universal.
What is extraordinary about this effort is Caplan’s ability to be at once incisive and sweet, brutal and clairvoyant, swinging from moments of tenderness and volubility to fiery bursts of dark humour, all while combining the forces of schtick, irony and narrative to propel the listener through a study of love, loss and struggle. Caplan manages to follow the raconteur’s template nearly to a tee while still feeling wholly original. This is, after all, what great storytellers do, and if nothing else, on Old Stock, he has proven to be just that.
Tour Dates:
Sept 12, 2018 – Moncton, NB, Cathedral Church
Sept 14, 2018 – Halifax, NS, Rebecca Cohen
Sept 20, 2018 – London, UK, The Lexington
Sept 21, 2018 – London, UK, The Lexington
Sept 22, 2018 – London, UK, The Lexington
Sept 23, 2018 – Paris, France, Les Etoiles
Sept 25, 2018 – Nijmegen, Netherlands, Merelyn
Sept 26, 2018 – Rotterdam, Netherlands, Rotown
Sept 27, 2018 – Utrecht, Netherlands, Tivoli/Vrede
Sept 28, 2018 – Cologne, Germany, Luxor
Sept 30, 2018 – Munich, Germany, Ampere
Oct 1, 2018 – Berlin, Germany, Bi Nuu
Oct 2, 2018 – Copenhagen, Denmark, VEGA
Oct 3, 2018 – Oslo, Norway, John Dee
Oct 5, 2018 – Hamburg, Germany, Knust