Gurf Morlix spent much of his career producing other people's music and contributing his insights to the works of Lucinda Williams, Ray Wylie Hubbard, Buddy Miller, Peter Case, and Jim Lauderdale, among many. Along the way, he's managed to record his own music and release a number of albums that belong in the collections of anyone who keeps tabs on the artists listed herein. His vocals—flat, sometimes over-pained, sometimes resigned and stoic—bring a sense of inevitability to these eloquently written tales. Here, his friends and fellow musicians help out. Eliza Gilkyson contributes harmony vocals. Rick Richards brings his drums. Ian McLagan, Patterson Barrett, and Nick Connolly move behind the organ, and Ray Bonneville serves up blues harp. "Series of Closing Doors" adds an ominous touch. "Bang Bang Bang" sings without a flinch about lives lost to guns. "My Life's Been Taken" studies the downward trajectory of prison life. "Small Window" proves people don't need jail to keep a limited worldview but that the best of us try to expand that vision.