Neil Valmonte’s ‘The Road I Didn’t Plan On’ is a considered, reflective piece about the realisation that the paths you never intended to take can end up being the very ones that define you. It’s the second release from the Connecticut-based songwriter (his debut being ‘Down by the River’) and continues the theme of resilience from that first record in a more accepting, more appreciative way. Instead of seeing the detours as something you have to get over, he looks at how the meaning of those detours can shift over time and how the people you meet and the experiences you have along the way are the very things that shape you. The core idea is as simple as it is profound: you can never know whether the road that takes you furthest from the life you thought you were going to have is the wrong one or the one that will ultimately teach you who you were meant to be. “Sometimes the road that takes us furthest from the life we imagined is the very road that teaches us who we were meant to become.”
The music on this one gives it a much more intimate feel than on Valmonte’s debut. “Down by the River” was all distorted, anthemic guitars and a very strong, determined character. “The Road I Didn’t Plan On” is very different in that it’s all melodic violas and semi-acoustic guitar. There’s no choir at all which takes away the sense of a group of people all singing along and gives the song a much more introspective feel. That’s the whole point of the song really. It’s not about overcoming every obstacle or insisting that everything is going to work out. It’s about the acceptance that some of the hard times, the disappointments, the unexpected detours and the changes of direction are all going to be part of the story. It was recorded in Valmonte’s amateur basement studio in Connecticut and again it’s a song that he’s written and produced entirely on his own. The quiet strength of the song is in the notion that what might seem like a bad turn today could well turn out to be an absolutely essential part of the journey.
Valmonte’s approach to the music is in itself a statement of authenticity. It’s a direct result of the advice of Kurt Vonnegut to “go out and make art just to grow the soul of the artist” rather than to make art for the sake of acclaim. He sees music as a way of getting his own thoughts out into the world and any connection that is made with the listener is a bonus. The song is a look back at the people and the experiences that have shaped the narrator and it doesn’t pretend that every moment was an easy one to understand at the time. As he continues to build towards a full album, his readiness to let each story dictate its own musical style is the hallmark of an artist who is far more concerned with emotional truth than with genre. “The Road I Didn’t Plan On” is therefore more than just a song about a road not taken. It’s an invitation to re-examine the journeys we once thought we didn’t have and the experiences that have brought us to where we are now. “We may not have chosen every turn of the road but with time the road we didn’t plan on can become a story that is worth telling.”