While The Ax in the Oak was more complex in its sound, Mirepoix and Smoke is a decidedly more bucolic affair; its songs are barely accompanied by more than Weaver's guitar or banjo and his voice, allowing for a more sensory experience of Weaver's signature lyrical poetics.You just don't hear Mirepoix and Smoke you smell it, taste it, feel it and see it. This is a coming-of-age album for Weaver. He'd gone through a divorce, was working his first job in 7 years, and found that life for what it was, rather than the romanticized version of it he had written about before, was worth exploring.