Kevin Bronson on May 28th, 2015

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Singer-songwriter Josh Rouse has crafted a catalog of starkly honest songs that, to generalize, examine the human condition — his and by transference his listeners’. His 11th full-length “The Embers of Time,” written in his home base of the past decade, the Mediterranean outpost of Valencia, Spain, was realized during what the 43-year-old calls an existential crisis for which he sought the help of a professional. The Nebraska native jokingly calls the album “my surreal, ex-pat therapy life album,” but on a serious tip part of his therapy involved itemizing experiences from his past, such as “growing up and moving around a lot and never really having a father figure, per se,” he explains. He brings one of those stops to life in the song “Crystal Falls.” “I used to live in a little town called Sonora in California,” Rouse says. “I went to the eighth grade there. It was a typical California school that you see in movies where the lockers are outside. It’s a really beautiful place. This songs about looking back and being a young kid in a certain place and having fond memories about that.” “The Embers of Time” came out in April via Yep Roc.

||| Live: Josh Rouse plays tonight at the Troubadour.

||| Also: Check out Rouse’s new video for “New Young” here.

Photo by York Wilson