LE REN - Don't Be Funny Without Me LE REN

On Don’t Be Funny Without Me (DBFWM), Le Ren tells us, “I love the man I wanted to be,” as a matter of tender fact. She is funny while devastating, self-aware and a little self-deceiving. Across the record, she holds those contradictions close: shameless and ashamed, honest but still searching for a version of the truth that hurts a little less. DBFWM is an album about love, jealousy, and the uneasy ways the two often intertwine. After touring the world opening for artists like Jeff Tweedy, Devendra Banhart and Men I Trust, Le Ren decided to return to Canada to make DBFWM. Recorded in Mountain Grove, Ontario, the album is self-produced alongside old friends Fez Gielen and Jonas Bonetta. Le Ren’s lyrics are imbued with that northern endurance, like watching the sunset fade behind the cracked asphalt on avenue du Parc, or from the parking lot of your favourite On Route. Where Leftovers was unadorned, evocative in its simplicity, DBFWM presents a fuller sound— fiddles, drums, layers of harmony. Powerfully capturing Le Ren’s musical evolution, DBFWM is more expansive, more experienced, and more earnest, representing the artist’s claim to the fuller, wisened life she has earned. Le Ren’s signature angelic vocals are newly complemented by a full band. With driving lead guitar and multiple vocals woven into rich harmony, the record feels like the lovechild of an 80s-era Emmylou Harris and the indignant Gillian Welch of her Time (The Revelator) years. Aching and intoxicating, Don’t Be Funny Without Me is a post-breakup road trip with your best friend: no fixed destination, a trunk full of baggage (literal and figurative) and mottled sunlight warming your face through the car window.