Album Review Roundup: Vol. 1, No. 37

A stellar week led by new Amanda Shires and vintage Charley Pride.

Amanda Shires

Nobody’s Girl

In every way that matters, this could be her “Silver Springs.” The hurts she writes about here are as riveting when they are interior as they are when they erupt to the surface, and that makes for a break-up album that is close to the peak of the form. Her best.

 

Neko Case

Neon Gray Midnight Green

The aesthetic is a bit more subdued than her norm, but the arrangements reward close, repeated listens. The writing strikes an even balance between conventional structures and her more idiosyncratic, prose-poem style, too. She remains a fascinating storyteller and vital artist.

 

Will Hoge

Sweet Misery

The best tracks here– and that’s most of them, really– push into full-on Matthew Sweet and Fountains of Wayne power-pop, and it works phenomenally well for Hoge’s frustrated and world-weary POV. An unexpected aesthetic pivot that results in what may well be his best album to date.

 

Josh Ross

Later Tonight

It’s Pledge Week up in Canada, too. He’s notable for how the Manosphere’s rampant misogyny has taken root in men of his generation; the “girl” he’s singing to on every track of this was wise to run, because the sense of entitlement runs deep. And of course he has a hit.

 

Rosie Flores & The Talismen

Impossible Frontiers

In a better timeline, she’s as well-known as the acts like Dwight, Lucinda, and Los Lobos she came up with, and her latest reaffirms how she’s always sat at the dead center of the Venn Diagram between the late 80s’ New Traditionalists & 90s’ alt-country boom.

Her signature guitar-work, in particular, shines on this collection, which is both as thoughtful and as fun as her albums always are. She even resurrects 90s single “Honky Tonk Moon” with her ace backing crew, The Talismen, who nail the blend of honky-tonk and pure rockabilly at every turn.

 

Chase Rice

ELDORA

Continues admirable efforts at growth, atonement for his especially sleazy Bro era, but he’s hitting his ballcap on his ceiling here. A marginal singer and competent-at-best writer, the strongest songs here still pale in comparison to, say, Kip Moore’s similar, superior album.

 

Anne Murray

Here You Are

Any time is a good time for a reconsideration of exactly how good Murray actually was. This set collects previously unreleased material recorded over decades, with relatively minimal remastering, courtesy of her now-adult children.

To that end, it’s of a piece with Murray’s work in that it is country music by and for adults, with little to no regard for what’s currently on trend. Sure, the arrangements can get a bit anodyne, but Murray’s singing, as ever, has more grit and soul than she’s often credited for.

 

Charley Pride

Endlessly: A Tribute to Brook Benton

I won’t pretend to have the scuttle as to why this was shelved when it was recorded back in the 1980s and is only getting a proper release now, but the optics of that are what they are, and what they are is consistent with what Pride often had to endure in his career.

So here we have a country icon paying tribute to a still under-heralded talent whose influence truly transcends genre. The arrangements on Pride’s covers of Benton’s singles– some hits, some that should’ve been hits– highlight how they all work perfectly as country records.

But it’s Pride’s singing, unsurprisingly, that makes this an essential addition to his catalog. The low notes he hits shake the walls, and his phrasing is as intuitive and natural as on any of his own classics. It does as right by both Pride and Benton as a posthumous release possibly could.