Kevin Morby has always been a songwriter obsessed with place. His albums have followed him through different landscapes, each one becoming a document of where he was and what those surroundings revealed back to him. With Little Wide Open, his eighth studio album, Morby returns to the Midwest — not as someone looking backward, but as someone finally understanding the place that shaped him. The album is filled with wide skies, highways, small towns, loneliness, and the strange comfort that comes from realizing time keeps moving whether we fight it or not. Produced by Aaron Dessner, Little Wide Open finds Morby balancing the weight of mortality with a genuine sense of wonder.
The opening track “Badlands” sets the stage immediately. It is a love letter to the Midwest, but not the postcard version. Morby finds beauty in the same places that can feel isolating — endless horizons, empty roads, and the ever-present possibility of a storm rolling through. Justin Vernon’s falsetto, woven into the song like distant tornado sirens, adds another layer of unease and mystery. That tension runs throughout the album. On “Javelin,” Morby reflects on love, distance, and returning home alone, while “Die Young” turns a title that sounds bleak into something much more thoughtful: an acknowledgment that a life well lived matters more than simply avoiding the inevitable.
Aaron Dessner’s production is the perfect match for Morby’s songwriting. Rather than pushing the record toward the polished indie rock sound often associated with Dessner’s other projects, he leaves room for the songs to breathe. Guitars shimmer, pedal steel drifts through the background, and fiddle and banjo add warmth without distracting from Morby’s voice. The guest list is impressive — Lucinda Williams, Justin Vernon, Katie Gavin, Amelia Meath, and Meg Duffy all contribute — but the album never feels like a collection of cameos. These musicians feel like they are adding color to Morby’s world rather than pulling attention away from it. Williams’ appearance on “Natural Disaster” is especially powerful, bringing a lifetime of experience to a song about love, destruction, and the things we cannot control.
The center of Little Wide Open is Morby’s changing relationship with time. Songs like “100,000,” “Field Guide for the Butterflies,” and the sprawling eight-minute title track examine aging, memory, and the realization that every moment is temporary. There is a maturity here, but not the kind that comes from having everything figured out. Morby still sounds curious, still searching, still aware that life is full of contradictions. The Midwest can feel enormous and lonely, but it can also provide the space to think, reflect, and appreciate the small details that often pass unnoticed.
With Little Wide Open, Kevin Morby has created a record that feels like an artist taking stock without becoming trapped by nostalgia. It is an album about accepting change, carrying your past with you, and finding meaning in the uncertain spaces between where you have been and where you are going. Morby has spent years documenting different chapters of his life, but this one feels especially clear-eyed. The view is wide open, the road keeps stretching ahead, and for once, he seems perfectly comfortable riding along. – Jason Felton