Plenty of guitarists have made the leap from expressive solo instrumentalists to arrangement-oriented songwriters, but few navigate it with the ease or panache that Irish musician Cian Nugent displays on Night Fiction. Seemingly hell-bent on
reclaiming his family’s good name from a certain nutzoid Texan guitarist, the album still builds from Nugent’s instrumental voice but discovers that his singing voice is just as plaintive and self-aware— his lyrics somehow an extension of his playing. The guitar is front and center (and boldly dashing) on solo instrumental acoustic performances like “Lucy,” but serves even better on the solo non-instrumental “Nightlife,” which seems to open a late-night channel to whatever world
Neil Young’s “Motion Pictures” was broadcast from. But Night Fiction accelerates gleefully from quiet reveries to full-tilt-boogie, as on the nearly 12 minutes of the album-closing “Year of the Snake.” There’s nothing else nearly as long, and yet it also seems to encapsulate Nugent’s M.O.—standing alone while still connected to everything around him by his unmistakable voice, audible everywhere.