Mark Lanegan’s traumatic memoir, Sing Backwards and Weep, just published, recounts the Pacific Northwest singer’s deep dive into addiction, wrongdoing and despair throughout the 90s. Written after the manuscript, Straight Songs of Sorrow is a companion piece, working over episodes from Lanegan’s misspent youth with an array of scalpels: the folk-blues to which Lanegan’s fathoms-deep voice naturally defaults (Burying Ground) and the 80s electronics of his more recent records (Bleed All Over).

At Zero Below combines both approaches; the addition of Warren Ellis’s banshee fiddle just compounds the chill of this particular episode. One of the best tracks Lanegan has ever recorded opens the album. I Wouldn’t Want to Say pairs an untypical vocal with a machine loop rhythm.

That’s Led Zeppelin’s John Paul Jones playing mellotron on Ballad of the Dying Rover, another pummelling electronic take on the blues. “Death is my due,” Lanegan sings. Throughout both the book and this affecting record, Lanegan’s bewilderment at cheating the reaper is ever fresh. Hangin’ on (for DRC), a love song to his close friend, Earth’s Dylan Carlson, muses on how Lanegan and Carlson are still here when their close friend Kurt Cobain – and dozens of others – are not.