Iron And Wine & Ben Bridwell // Sing Into My Mouth

Iron And Wine & Ben Bridwell

Sing Into My Mouth

Black Cricket Recording

3/5 stars

Iron And Wine's Sam Beam and Band of Horses' Ben Bridwell are both gifted singers who have enchanted listeners with impassioned performances. Sing Into My Mouth brings the pair together, as both men tackle some of the songs of the artists they admire. What you get are a dozen lovely performances that never really feel all that essential. Beam and Bridwell can certainly sing, and their vocals are the highlight of the album, but many of the songs end up running together in a mix of folky covers that don't always stand out from one another. Opening track "This Must Be the Place" is one of the exceptions, as the duo transforms the track in a warm, fingerpicked version of the Talking Heads track. Each singer has his highlight moments on Sing Into My Mouth, which become the best parts of the album, a covers project with some nice, but ultimately unspectacular results.  — Alex Bieler