Congratulations, the new album from songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Jacob Ungerleider, is the result of the casual playing of his demo tracks in the home of musicians Jenn Wasner and Alan Good Parker. Wasner, a member of Flock of Dimes and Wye Oak, kept asking Parker who was singing those songs on their Los Angeles stereo, and it turned out Parker was playing demos by the Virginia-based pianist he had met when they were touring with Natalie Prass. Ungerleider had recently moved to Los Angeles, and Wasner, who fell in love with these tracks, vowed to help Ungerleider put these songs together for an album.
In addition to co-producing Congratulations with Ungerleider, Wasner also sings and plays a variety of instruments on the record, as do Parker and a small contingent of fellow musicians, and the album was released on her 2 Heads label. This attention results in Ungerleider’s compositions positively shining, underscoring the self-doubt, grace, and wit of his songs. There’s a deep, low-key sophistication here that straddles lines between the quiet elegance of Elliott Smith and the timeless stylings of Harry Nilsson.
While the opening title track—with Ungerleider on vocals, keyboards, and euphonium, assisted by Wasner on vocals—kicks things off as a subtle overture in the form of a defeatist love song, a full band joins in with the winsome power-pop of “Everything You Can”, aided greatly by Parker’s keening pedal steel. Acoustic guitar and the emotional pull of Macie Stewart’s strings beautifully frame the eloquence of “Blacksburg”, as Ungerleider reflects on a breakup: “Now I’m more alone than I have ever been / You said someday I’ll get what I pay for / Man I didn’t know that this is what you meant / Remember when you swung open that screen door / To pull me in?”
The documentation of Jacob Ungerleider’s relationships sometimes takes on odd forms, as the acoustic guitar-led ballad “Spirit” evokes the budget airline of the same name, made clear as the song ends: “There you were, right on time,” he sings. “But I was mistaken like a passenger still waiting / For a flight on Spirit Airlines.” Like the best lyricists, Ungerleider’s songs carry the heft of elegant short stories.
Ungerleider sings of love and loss, but also personal self-growth and the need to please, as on the gentle, graceful “I Wanna Be Fine”, where he reflects: “I wanna dress like a movie star / I want to impress the guy behind the bar / And speak in a way that everyone believes me / And never feel the need to get so high / I wanna be fine.” The production backdrops are wide and varied, and serve the songs exquisitely. In “7 Dollar Coffee”, Ungerleider’s Wurlitzer electric piano and Devonne Harris’ compact drumming give the tune an uncommon warmth.
For someone who spent so long playing on other people’s records, Jacob Ungerleider is supremely confident and utterly charming, yet refreshingly relatable. On Congratulations, he’s an artist who, according to his Bandcamp page, “Wears a heart on his sleeve that might look a lot like yours.”