After almost ten years as a band and four albums to its credit, Cuff the Duke has made … a concept record. The Toronto roots rockers wouldn’t call it that (there are no suites about dragons here), but there it is, 10 tracks on a theme that flow like a film, like a good book, one filled with emotional highs and lows, plot twists, and universal truths. Morning Comes is a story about change, about confronting loss, about – as one track calls it -- “Standing on the Edge” and having the courage to look across to an unknown future on the other side.

Cuff the Duke has approached these heavy themes not with mopiness or despair but with strength, like men raised on John Wayne and Bruce Springsteen. (Which they were.) Nor is Morning Comes a collection of sad songs. Rather, some of the most infectious pop and upbeat rock the band has crafted yet. As with their 2009 record Way Down Here, they’ve enlisted as producer Greg Keelor of Blue Rodeo, recording in his farmhouse studio in a manner than brings immediacy and authenticity to the recordings.

Morning Comes also continues the band’s habit of sequencing tracks as A and B-sides, in the tradition of vinyl records. It will in fact be pressed on vinyl and released as a foursided double album, with one side featuring an etching of the cover art and one side containing just one track, the epic “Bound to Your Own Vices,” a song Wayne calls the album’s narrative and sonic turning point. “It really sums up the record: it’s got poppy bits, rootsy bits, it’s slow and sad and rocking and upbeat, all in 8 minutes.”

Cuff the Duke is: Wayne Petti (Vocals, Electric and Acoustic Guitars), Paul Lowman (Bass, Vocals), François Turenne (Guitar, Pedal Steel) and A.J. Johnson (Drums).