Willy Vlautin is a master world builder. Over the course of half a dozen albums with The Delines, he has created the equivalent of an intricate portmanteau movie with recurring themes and characters making return appearances. In his other career as an author, his most recent novel ‘The Horse’ was about an old musician riddled with alcoholism and anxiety, and was littered with song titles, two of which were taken from the previous Delines album, ‘Mr Luck & Ms Doom’. This interconnectedness is reflected in the origins of their latest collection, ‘The Set Up’, which began with a handful of songs Vlautin brought to the 2025 album recording sessions that were of the same world but approached from a different angle.
That should not give the impression that ‘The Set Up’ is a compilation of rejects. While it does not have the romance, albeit doomed aptly enough, of its predecessor, it focuses instead on grifters and the desperate actions needed for survival, especially amongst those in the grip of America’s opioid epidemic. It is a subject that has received less attention in the UK but the album makes a good companion piece to Patrick Radden Keefe’s journalistic investigation ‘Empire of Pain’ and Barbara Kingsolver’s novel ‘Demon Copperhead’.
Structurally, ‘The Set Up’ differs from its predominantly song-based predecessor. The twelve tracks on the new release consist of three instrumentals; a three-part spoken word title track dotted throughout the album; while the remaining half of the album are pure songs. ‘The Set Up Part One’ starts the album with a lonely and evocative trumpet creating the mood over which Amy Boone’s softly spoken narration tells the tale of a couple setting fire to a half-built hotel in Lafayette, pocketing eighty grand and moving to Spain. Part Two introduces Brenda who embezzled a hundred and twenty thousand while the final part is the penultimate track on the album and sees the narrator’s romantic promises prove to be the ultimate grift.
Boone’s voice is an instantly recognisable part of a Deline’s song. It has a lived in quality, the sound of someone who has seen too much yet has somehow retained their humanity and empathy. It is seen to perfect effect on ‘Can You Get Me Out of Phoenix?’ backed by Cory Gray’s exquisite country soul arrangement which starts softly and turns stirring as the narrator reflects, “I ain’t built for the Sunbelt even / Sitting by a pool all day long / Just makes me think / of all the things that go wrong.” The slow piano gospel ‘Dilaudid Diane’ exemplifies Vlautin’s economy as a writer. In a small number of lines he sketches the title character whose early promise (cross country runner, trumpeter in the marching band, lover of French movies) turns sour (maxed out credit card and 63 bucks, stuck outside Tijuana with a bad tooth and black eye). The horns play a big part in ‘Keep The Shades Down’ matching the friskiness as the narrator pleads “come back to bed, and to me” before ending in a melancholy mood.
Gray’s arrangements are seen at their finest in the album’s longest track, over five minutes of ‘The Reckless Life’ veering from swooning romanticism as the song’s subject is described as “a hopeless romantic in love with every guy on TV” before throwing in some harsher guitar wah wahs as the sting is revealed. ‘Walking With His Sleeves Down’ is the most minimal song, just piano and vocals, the personification of a quiet storm with Boone’s voice bearing the weight of the character’s trudge through town. In contrast, there is a bossa nova swing and bits of backward masking to ‘The Meter Keeps Ticking’ while the rhythm conjures the movement of the taxi meter as a woman goes to visit her husband in a mental hospital and realises that she cannot bear to get out of the car.
Of the instrumentals, ‘Jumping Off In Madras’ starts with mournful trumpet before brushed drums and whirring, soulful organ add to the emotion. It was conceived as a piece for the woman jumping off the train in ‘Her Ponyboy’ on their previous album, another example of how a Delines song world interconnects. ‘Getting Out of the Ward’ is written for the patient in ‘The Meter Keeps Ticking’ and is led by piano, gradually gaining drama as strings and horns stir the pot. ‘The Last Time I Saw Her’ closes out the album and is the most formally adventurous piece, its atmospheric piano and horns mirroring the character’s confusion at being conned.
‘The Set Up’ shows The Delines still at the peak of their powers. It is storytelling at its finest, the characters are often betrayed by their actions but retain the listener’s sympathies. The grifting described is borne of necessity in a society with no safety net and allows space to join the dots and acknowledge that the biggest grifter of all is America’s president who has no excuses except ego and greed for his behaviour. The musical arrangements enhance the atmosphere and give ‘The Set Up’ a magnificently cinematic scope.
The Delines: The Set Up – Out 6 March 2026 (Décor Records)
Delines – Dilaudid Diane – [Live in Studio]
I was editor of the long-running fanzine, Plane Truth, and have subsequently written for a number of publications. While the zine was known for championing the most angular independent sounds, performing in recent years with a community samba percussion band helped to broaden my tastes so that in 2021 I am far more likely to be celebrating an eclectic mix of sounds and enthusing about Made Kuti, Anthony Joseph, Little Simz and the Soul Jazz Cuban compilations as well as Pom Poko and Richard Dawson.
