Description
Tim Grimm’s new album, The Little In-Between, is an evocative artistic evolution from his previous albums. For most of Tim’s 25-year music career as a storytelling balladeer in the tradition of John Prine, Woody Guthrie, and Bob Dylan, he has written primarily about family, community, history, and social issues, often framed by his strong sense of place and his many years on the rural family farm he built in his home state of Indiana.
In The Little In-Between, Tim starts with reflections on the farm and his history on the land he loves, but the album moves quickly from external geography to a more internal landscape. To illuminate this journey, Tim uses a first-person narrative in every song, laying the words bare and giving listeners access to a deep inner territory which usually remains more submerged in his songwriting. My last album, written in the middle of the covid pandemic, was much more social-political, much more about the world. But this one is intensely personal. I’m a fairly private person, and I think of myself as an observer. I’ve previously shied away from writing albums too much directly about me – but this one couldn’t be avoided.
This series of songs is a search for peace, a meditation on loss and grief, and ultimately also an expression of love. The arc of the album traces Tim’s literal journey from the hills of Southern Indiana to the Oklahoma prairie, and also his internal journey from a rich past toward an unexpected future, focusing on the heart-breaking, heart-making space … in-between.