I came into Jenn Wasner’s world through ‘Long After Midnight’, a song that stopped me in my tracks earlier this year. Back then, I wrote about how she stripped everything back until only the truth was left, voice, guitar, silence. It felt like eavesdropping on someone quietly taking stock. That single hinted at something deeper, and The Life You Save delivers exactly that. It’s an album that doesn’t flinch. It looks addiction, co-dependency and self-forgiveness squarely in the eye, yet somehow still finds peace in the space between.
Wasner has been part of so many worlds; Wye Oak, Bon Iver, Sylvan Esso, Dirty Projectors, but this is unmistakably hers. Produced alongside Nick Sanborn and recorded between Chapel Hill and Los Angeles, it feels like she’s drawn a circle around herself and said, this is where I begin again. The sound is more grounded in Americana and folk this time, soft around the edges, with the electronic shimmer of Head of Roses replaced by something earthier. You can hear the wood of the guitar, the breath before each line, the quiet resolve behind the words.
As mentioned, this album deals with heavy subjects and on that point Wasner has this to say.
“My previous records, generally, have been a summary of things I had already been through— experiences I had observed and reflected upon, reporting back from some amount of distance. But this record is different. It is an attempt to report from inside of a process that is ongoing and unfinished, from which I will likely never fully emerge as long as I am alive: my struggle within the cycles of addiction and co-dependency.”
This sounds like we are in for an emotional journey. Time to buckle up!
‘Afraid’ opens the record in a hush. It feels like the calm after a storm, but there’s a heaviness too. The melody is just stunning building in waves across its runtime. Instrumentation is subtle leaving the vocal to carry the song. Wasner sings not from detachment but from the centre of it. That admission sets the tone. The album isn’t about closure; it’s about staying present while everything keeps shifting underneath.
We segue neatly into ‘Keep Me In The Dark’ which moves with a subtle pulse. There’s an intimacy in the way she phrases each line, as if the words are still forming. You can feel her wrestling with the need for clarity against the need for comfort. It’s a song about knowing something isn’t right but wanting to hold it just a bit longer anyway. The arrangement is gentle and screams of classic singer songwriters from the sixties and seventies.
When ‘Long After Midnight’ arrives, it still stuns. I remember describing it before as beautifully restrained, trusting the song to do the heavy lifting. Within the album, it carries even more weight, a quiet moment of acceptance in a record full of searching. Upright bass, steel guitar, a few well-placed drum strokes, nothing distracts from her voice. It’s an anchor. The track feels like a hinge, the point where she starts to look inward rather than outward.
‘Defeat’ arrives on an acapella wave, echoing that same stillness but with a touch more defiance. The song deals with the idea that to admit defeat isn’t to give up, but to finally stop pretending you can control what can’t be fixed. The rhythm rises and falls like breathing, the arrangement swelling just enough to let light in but never fully bloom. It’s a reminder that peace often comes disguised as surrender.
That restrained production continues on ‘Close To Home’, a song as tender as its name suggests. The bass and synth warbles provide the canvas for Wasner to paint her vocal magic on. Her voice drifts through memory, revisiting people and places that shaped her, but with the distance of time softening the edges. You can sense gratitude buried in the grief but above all a recognition that even the painful moments belong to the story.
On ‘The Enemy’, she turns the lens fully on herself. It’s haunting in its honesty, tracing the thin line between helping and controlling, between love and ego. I love the contrast between the gentle country licks slamming into a guitar teetering on the edge of total fuzzed out feedback. Just as in the rest of the album, there’s no self-pity here, just the recognition of a pattern and the quiet relief of finally naming it.
While Wasner has tipped her hat to the classic singer songwriters up until now ‘Not Yet Free’ could have come from a Laurel Canyon house party. Her gently picked guitar and emotional vocal bring to mind those powerful women who defined that sound. I get lost in this song’s undulating and serpentine melody and I defy you not to be moved.
Then comes ‘Pride’, which normally comes before a fall. Not here though. The whole track just feels so overwhelmingly warm and welcoming. The song is dynamically tuned to perfection; the song rises and falls to meet the power and emotional intensity of the vocal. Theres a lovely guitar lick that appears in the gaps every now and then which makes me smile every time.
‘Theo’ is one of the gentlest tracks here, a quiet letter to someone who might never hear it. There’s something devastating in how softly she sings it, as if raising her voice would break the spell. The slide guitar sighs behind her as she sings “call on God, don’t call on me… I can’t carry you.” That recognition a core part of the themes of the album.
‘Instead Of Calling’ brings the tempo up slightly, though the gentle self-discovery remains. Wasner’s gift has always been her ability to find melody in the cracks, this track might be her finest example yet. The gently plucked guitar and mournful violin really complement each other nicely. She seems to be singing about the end of a codependent relationship and accepting that it is the right thing to do.
We flow into ‘River In My Arms’ next on guitar, piano and soft percussion, flowing with a calm acceptance. It’s as if she’s tracing the path of her own growth, recognising that every mistake carried her here. You can almost feel the warmth of the morning light through the studio window, her voice steady and clear.
The closing track ‘I Think I’m God’ brings it all together. The line “I think I’m god; I know I’m not” is the pivot on which the whole record turns. It’s the sound of someone facing the uncomfortable truth of ego and still choosing compassion. There’s no grand finale, no orchestral swell: just the quiet understanding that being human is enough.
Taken as a whole, The Life You Save feels less like a collection of songs and more like a conversation stretched across fifty minutes. Every note, every pause, every tiny crack in Wasner’s voice feeds into the next, so that by the end you feel you’ve travelled with her rather than simply listened. There’s an incredible warmth that radiates from her performances, a deep compassion that never wavers even when she’s staring straight at the hardest truths. It’s rare to hear an artist so open yet so composed, so vulnerable yet so sure of what she wants to say. Just from listening I know Jen Wasner is a good soul, in every sense. In time, this will be seen as one of those records people return to for comfort and clarity, a quiet classic born from honesty and grace. In a world full of noise, The Life You Save might just be your own.
The Life You Save is out now via Sub Pop Records. You can also listen and order on the Flock of Dimes Bandcamp page.
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Photo Credit
Elizabeth Weinberg
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