In the past few years there's been a growing trend of the sorta-double album, one record with a warm reception followed by another less than a year later, recorded from the same sessions. The press releases always give the same tired promise: that these songs just didn't fit, thematically or however else, in with the first LP - it's definitely not that these songs were too weak to be included on the earlier LP. Often these records won't necessarily be bad, but always have their fair share of filler, and only the most avid fanboys will argue that these records definitely need to exist. I'm looking at you, Okkervil River's The Stand Ins, and Why's Eskimo Snow.
Cass McCombs half escapes this trend – Humor Risk is genuinely cut from a different cloth to the stunning Wit's End, released only as recently as April. There's an entirely different sound to this record - a different drive, different lyrical themes, and subtle changes in production - yet it's still essentially a Cass McCombs record at heart. Unfortunately, it's just not that strong a record; nothing here sounds like a Wit's End cast-off, but none of these songs are good enough to feature on that vastly superior record.
Again, this is not a bad record as such, and certainly worth Spotifying, perhaps even buying if you've enjoyed the elusive singer-songwriter's previous work. There isn't anything you could explicitly call a dud, but nothing that would ever make a hypothetical Greatest Hits – opener 'Love Thine Enemy' almost sounds like something that would have featured on short-lived lad-rock channel The Amp alongside The Charlatans and The Seahorses, but it sort of works (sort of, mind). 'The Same Thing' is the closest thing to a highlight, with a decent vocal hook and rhythm, though it still outstays its welcome at over six minutes, and 'Mystery Mail' has the same story at just under eight.
There are the technical and tangible details that distinguish this record from its twin – a higher average BPM, a higher prominence of drums, and the feel of a band rather than a singer + backing band. Then there's the more laid back approach to lyrics, rarely reaching poignant but clearly written with a cheeky smile – yes, there are still tales of being “stabbed with a ballpoint pen about sixty times by his cellmate Charles” and rare pop song namechecks of Ho Chi Minh, Lao Tzu and Confucius (this is Cass McCombs, after all) – but this is actually the closest you'll get to hearing a one of his records described as fun, and, while the songs aren't incredible or even memorable, it's an interesting experiment just to see one of today's best songwriters experimenting, if not entirely succeeding in doing so.