The planning of the album started when Foucault was in Iowa sharing the stage with The Pines, a Minneapolis-based group that included the sons of Bo Ramsey, who had produced Foucault's album Ghost Repeater. Ramsey sat in with the group and afterwards Foucault arranged for him to work on the recordings for Salt as Wolves. (The album title comes from the Shakespeare play Othello.) "Blues for Jessie Mae" is a tribute to blues singer Jessie Mae Hemphill.[2]
Writing for The New York Times, critic Ben Ratliff wrote that "Foucault sings in a rich, textured, word-smearing voice about subjects of burned-out middle age: love, lying, regret, highways, hauntings, escape, aloneness, forgiveness, the value of a simple thing, the void without it." He called the album " immaculately tailored within a certain tradition... It is aesthetically informed up to the eyes. It sounds casual, but it can grow oppressive quickly.[3]
Track listing
All songs by Jeffrey Foucault unless otherwise noted.
