We’re back again to start the week with some things we’ve been listening to. Charles goes first this week, then David, and we’ve listed some reading recommendations at the end.
Tami Neilson – “Always on My Mind” (single, 2024)
I really didn’t think I needed another version of “Always on My Mind,” but Tami Neilson proved me wrong. Possessing an astonishing voice that’s able to effectively deliver everything from big-beat rejoinders to smoky ballads, Neilson’s sung Nelson (and with Nelson) before, a familiarity that gives her aching version of this standard a particular level of intimacy. Over only the barest washes of guitar and steel, Neilson draws out each rueful syllable of the now-standard written by Wayne Carson, Johnny Christopher, and Mark James. As in the best versions, including the leftfield hit from Pet Shop Boys, the sadness here is leavened (or maybe exacerbated) by loving acceptance for a partner who the singer knows they’ve done wrong. And, no matter how many times I’ve heard it, nothing prepares me for those devastating pleas in the bridge, which Neilson sings with a slight tremble and a deep sigh. A heartbreaking, heart-filling performance. – CH
Thin Lizzy – “A Song for While I’m Away” (acoustic) (from Acoustic Sessions, 2024)
Along with a deluxe reissue of the great band’s Vagabonds of the Western World, whoever’s in charge of Thin Lizzy’s catalog have issued several EPs of tracks from the original album and the odds-and-sods collected in the expanded edition. One is anchored by this “acoustic” version of the ballad “A Song for While I’m Away.” To be clear, it’s not acoustic: it’s a drum-less remix of the original track, so its purpose and provenance are a bit confusing. But I don’t care about any of that. Instead, I’m transfixed by how this version focuses even more on the beautiful hum of Phil Lynott’s voice. Lynott praises and promises his love, with strings, guitars, and English horn swirling around in a most effective blend of the band’s folk and rock influences. Is it “acoustic?” No. Is it “new?” Not really. Is it beautiful? Sure is. Will I keep turning it up? Of course. – CH
Luke Dick – “Shirt off My Back” (from Lockeland, 2024)
This track is full of surprises. Those surprises start with the interpolation of Tom Waits’ “Clap Hands,” of all things, they continue through a head-banging chorus, and they include a vocal from Dick that ranges from quiet-loud smolder to near-rapped sections. A country-funk ode to staying grounded and staying generous, “Shirt off My Back” evokes the music of Dick’s Oklahoma youth as much as it does the Nashville where he’s made himself known as songwriter, producer, and record-maker. (Including the inventive new album Lockeland that this track kicks off.) “Shirt off My Back” hits all the tropes (lyrical and musical) of backyard-BBQ bangers with none of the reductionism (again, lyrical and musical) that too often accompany the most well-worn of that niche. Keep it coming and keep us guessing. – CH
Wonder Women of Country – “Hanging on to You” (from Willis, Carper, Leigh, 2024)
We’ve already covered two of the six songs on the Wonder Women of Country’s delightful debut E.P., and I’m going to make it half of them with this swaying, swinging swoon led by Brennen Leigh. Beyond its general pleasures, I’m spotlighting this one because of its welcome evocation of the sound and sensibility of the great Spartanburg-to-Nashville-to-Austin trio Uncle Walt’s Band. There are days when that group’s mix of warm spirit, close harmonies, jazz chords, and string-band arrangements is my very favorite music of all, and as soon as the Wonder Women of Country locked into the chorus of “Hanging On To You” – going back and forth between unison and harmony – I legit got a chill realizing that this sweet track, and the whole E.P., was hitting those same pleasure centers. I can’t think of a better new-generation version than these three mighty artists. – CH
Tierra Whack – “Shower Song” (from World Wide Whack, 2024)
“I sound great,” Tierra Whack announces at the beginning of “Shower Song,” and it’s impossible to disagree with this assessment from this prodigious pop polymath. Even, or maybe especially, when she follows it with the less proclamatory (and more relatable) addition of “when I’m singing in the shower.” And, indeed, this is a song about morning self-care, with Tierra Whack getting ready and enjoying the rituals of exfoliation, skin care, and – especially – using the shower’s friendly acoustics to indulge her Aretha, Britney, and Whitney vocal dreams. The small, significant joy of such private performances – doubled here by a blurting keyboard riff and supportive background interjections of “This is funky!” – is neither overblown nor underplayed. Instead, Tierra Whack offers an infectious, funny tribute to the kind of musical release that can be important regular sustenance for anybody who just needs to take a minute and sound great before they head out into a world that doesn’t realize the talent and beauty in their midst. – CH
JJ Grey & Mofro – “Seminole Wind” (Olustee, 2024)
Just in time to celebrate the news that John Anderson will be inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame comes this riveting cover of one of the singer-songwriter’s most enduring hits. JJ Grey & Mofro are longtime southern rockers who I always like best when they tighten up their jam-band tendencies and highlight their hooks: A couple of their 2007 sides—the soul-countrypolitan “Circles” and the country-funky “Country Ghetto”—are among my favorite tracks this century. Here they retain the dramatic piano framing of Anderson’s 1992 original about profit-driven avarice and despoiled native lands that have left us all impoverished, and they underline the stakes by slowing things down, just a tad, and by stripping the arrangement to a spare if troubled rhythm bed. When they stretch out, as is Mofro’s way, it’s just a worried, thundering groove and doomsaying trumpets. Country’s greatest environmental anthem, recycled for climate-changed end times. –DC
Willow Avalon – “Honey Ain’t No Sweeter” and “Getting’ Rich, Goin’ Broke” (from Stranger, 2024)
From one direction, Willow Avalon totally reads as a roots-inclined hipster. She’s the Georgia-born offspring of performance and visual artist, author and alt.country singer-songwriter Jim White. A tour of her southern-curio packed Hell’s Kitchen apartment went viral on TikTok. She used to have a pet opossum. The best pair of cuts from her short debut album (or is it a long debut EP?) establish her studied but nonetheless affecting range. Echoey and pulsing, filigreed with touches of atmospheric noise, “Honey Ain’t No Sweeter” pillowtalks a lover, or at least a loved one, into grasping that “Love don’t make you weaker.” “Getting’ Rich…,” meanwhile, is a bouncy, hyper-twangy working artist’s lament about how “every dollar that I make finds its way back home to my family.” The former cut works a kin-to-Esther Rose vibe, the latter would fit nicely alongside your fave Brennen Leigh cut. It’s a winning combo, wise even: Love may not make you weaker, but it does often require a side hustle to pay for it. –DC
Kelly G w/ Candi Staton – “Power of One [Extended Mix]” (single, 2024)
Candi Staton is one of our great vocalists—a soul singer who, whether perfecting country soul in the sixties, going disco in the seventies, or doing a bit of everything ever since, invests her recordings with intense and distinctive emotional presence. Working here with house-music production legend Kelly G, Staton preaches a version of the gospel impulse to heal our nation—moving the crowd with pluralism (“Let’s forget about denomination!”) and antiracism (“Doesn’t matter what our color”) over an indomitable beat and with the understanding that “one” equals you and me together. Long road ahead, so I recommend the almost seven-minute extended version. –DC
War and Treaty – “Stealing a Kiss” (single, 2024)
This song, press reports says, is about an early moment in this married duo’s relationship when they were each too nervous to grab a kiss from the other before parting. This record, I say, comes with bigger stakes, thanks to Michael and Tanya Trotter trading their verses with old-school soul power, buffeted by pulse-pounding piano, anguished strings, and after stacking crescendo upon crescendo, squalling shredded guitar. What this stunning record conveys is not merely the regret of that long-ago missed opportunity but all the love they now know, a life together later, they might’ve missed. –DC
Reading recommendations:
-Matt Mitchell talks to Adrianne Lenker, for Paste
-Marc Hogan on what private equity is doing to music catalogs, for New York Times
-Craig Jenkins on Justin Timberlake, for Vulture
-Brittney McKenna talks to Kacey Musgraves, for Nashville Scene
-Grayson Haver Currin profiles River Shook, for New York Times
-Janell Hobson on Beyoncé’s album cover, for Ms. Magazine
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