Brandy Clark

Released on 19/05/2023 by Warner Records
Main artists: Brandy Clark
Genre: Pop

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Brandy Clark has had a hand in so many legacy-boosting songs: "Mama's Broken Heart" (Miranda Lambert), "Better Dig Two" (The Band Perry), "Biscuits" (Kacey Musgraves), to name just a few. "I'm a songwriter who also sings," she has said, echoing the ridiculous humility of Karen Carpenter saying she was just a drummer who also happened to sing. Clark's voice is magic—clear and warm and stirring something ineffable, free of "American Idol" frills and trills. While she's made some great records in the past, it took putting herself into the producer hands of that other great Brandi (Carlile, who lately has the Midas touch) to really position her voice front and center in the way it deserves. Tender and beautiful, "Buried" adds only guitar as Clark sings "If you don't want me/ If you're beyond me," her voice rising on each "if," tentative and questioning. It's also an incredible storytelling tool on the spare "Ain't Enough Rocks," about two sisters killing an abuser("a wolf in daddy's clothing") and dumping him in the river. Inspired by a line from Forrest Gump and lit by Derek Trucks' slow-burn guitar, the song is chilling, not giddy like the Chicks' "Goodbye Earl" or celebratory like Hardy's "Wait in the Truck." Carlile has said that hearing these songs "took me back to the first time I heard Car Wheels on a Gravel Road" by Lucinda Wiliams, and it's an apt line to draw. You can hear it in tracks like harmonica-kissed "Best Ones" and heat-hazy "Come Back to Me," with its excellent country chorus. Elsewhere, there are shades of 1980s Rosanne Cash in the epic "Northwest" (an ode to Clark and Carlile's native Washington State) and smooth and easy "All Over Again," which gets dressed up with soulful Honkettes-style harmony. Frequent Carlile collaborators Lucius suavely harmonize on "Tell Her You Don't Love Her." And Clark and Carlile duet on "Dear Insecurity," a piano ballad that pulls out all the stops—weeping strings, heartbreaking melody—but finds Carlile appropriately reining in the knockout power of her own voice. Placing the two perfectly side by side, it's a stunner. And Clark, who knows her way around a bitingly clever verse, gets every little detail right on "She Smoked in the House," a funny yet heartfelt tribute to her grandmother: "She smoked in the house/ Burnt holes in the couch/ Lipstick-circled butts in the ashtray/ She saved in Folders cans/ Swore credit was a scam/ Bought everything at Sears on layaway ... And I hate cigarettes/ But I miss all that smoke." © Shelly Ridenour/Qobuz

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Brandy Clark

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Ain't Enough Rocks (feat. Derek Trucks)