“The idea for the album was to let the songs speak for themselves.”

So says Central Rain’s Luke Thomas. And his new album, Paint Over Paint, tells a compelling tale of love and loss, family and forgotten friends, and the healing power of music.

“With your heart on your sleeve”, Luke has crafted a classic singer-songwriter collection with Paint Over Paint, a record so raw it’s as if the singer is perched on a barstool next to you, pouring out his life story.

Chances are you’ll see yourself in at least one of the songs.

Luke is singing “songs about people I don’t understand anymore”, where “the truth gets so messed up” and “the raindrops never land inside my cup”.

“A lot of the songs are very open and very personal,” he admits. “Rob was like, ‘That’s okay, records should be what they are … just keep doing it.’”

Rob is producer Robert Muiños (Didirri, Mia Wray), who was a driving force behind the record. “I got to know him pretty well when The Pictures did a tour with Phil Jamieson, and Rob was playing in Phil’s band,” Luke explains. “He heard my songs and said, ‘Mate, you really should do something.’”

Luke recorded the album in four days at Rob’s Rat Shack studios in Collingwood and mixed it in two. “I didn’t want to overdo anything,” he notes. “I wanted to keep it bare. Kind of grand but not too polished.”

Luke and Rob are joined on the record by guitarist Ashley Naylor (Paul Kelly, The Church, RocKwiz Orkestra), drummer Jess Ellwood (Alex Lahey) and piano man Olaf Scott (Teskey Brothers).

Luke is rightly proud of the record. “It feels like the first time ever that I might be entirely satisfied.”

Inspired by “my ultimate playlist, from Townes Earle to Dylan” (‘Hopeless Me’), and “a half-drunk Cabernet” (‘This Old Man’), Luke ponders some of life’s big questions, including “Should I call her up tonight and tell her how I feel?” (‘Valerian’) and “How will I go if I don’t have you around?” and “What do I do to get through the day?” (‘How Will I Go’).

As the artist realises that nothing lasts, he also discovers the power of music. Love hurts. Music heals. “We can hum a tune,” he sings in the bittersweet ‘She Showed Me To Her Room’, “we can dance along/ Clutching our hands, singing our songs.”

Then, in ‘How Will I Go’, “I spun a few records, lost in my head”.

In the end, the listener is gently urged to “close your eyes and sleep”.

“All the little scars seem to fade away eventually,” Luke Thomas declares in the closing cut, ‘In Dreams’. Yep, you might be battered and bruised, but you pick yourself up, dust yourself off and go again. Forgetting the pain and diving back in, headfirst. But deep down you know that no matter how many times you try to cover something up, the original truth will always remain.

Paint Over Paint.