Austin Sound

Scott Biram has always been known for his demented, electrified blues licks and harrowing ballads of the beaten down and bruised. The self-proclaimed “Dirty Old One Man Band” unloads a fury of hellbent skids and aching redemption, and his sixth album and third on the rebel roots imprint Bloodshot exorcises his tortured spirits in moments both brutal and begging. Like 2006’s Graveyard Shift, Biram walks the fine line between belligerence and penitence. That dichotomy is set from the start as Biram trades the CB for the opening answering machine message of “Hospital Escape.” “They’ve got me held prisoner over here,” Biram croaks out in a fevered morphine delusion. “Got me tied down to the bed. I really need your help, I need to get out of here.” The message is lifted from his infamous 2003 hospital stint after being crushed in a head on collision with an 18-wheeler. While Biram has never shied away from the tale, this moment of fear and helplessness so rawly exposed is revealing: Biram knows he’s on borrowed time, but doesn’t seem to know how to deal with that realization, and maybe that’s the purgatory that haunts the dual title Something’s Wrong/Lost Forever.