Breaking Point

Album review

Singer-songwriters Jade Jackson and Aubrie Sellers have toyed with melding rock and country on their respective solo records, but with their new team-up as Jackson+Sellers, the duo have created an irresistible genre of their own. There are dirty garage-rock guitars and racing drums on their cover of Julie Miller's stripped-bare "The Devil is an Angel," speeding up and beefing up the backwoods Americana track into something that sounds like it could've been recorded by a 2000s rock band like the Kills or Jet. That song is a pretty good encapsulation of Jackson+Sellers' style: devilish and angelic at once. So is "Wound Up," a rockabilly honky-tonk dervish set at a hyper-pop pace and adorned with sultry vocals, as well as "The World Is Black"—outlaw posturing with super scuzzy guitar and defiantly strutting drums. How many country songs do you find yourself head-banging to? "Breaking Point" is more country-flavored, with Sellers taking the lead and sounding like an edgier version of her mom, late '90s country superstar Lee Ann Womack (who broke out of Nashville's confining box herself with 2005's There's More Where That Came From, presaging a return to classic '70s sounds). "Fair Weather" feels like a big '80s ballad with crisp, almost synthetic drums and breezy vocals; you can imagine the sunset-on-the-beach video that would've accompanied Wilson Phillips or Belinda Carlisle's version. There's a sparky, surf-rock cover of Shannon Wright's "Has Been" and a drawn-out and completely unexpected, countrified take on Suzi Quatro's glam-punk "The Wild One"—bratty guitar like a slow-spreading sneer while Jackson and Sellers coo lines such as "I'm a green-eyed bitch and I wanna get rich" as if butter wouldn't melt. Spooky lullaby "Hush" illustrates Jackson's poetic and evocative flair for lyrics: "Wind's wild, sparrow beguiled/ By a rose of fragrance so sweet/ She swooped down low like wind to an arrow/ And crashed in its soil and seed." And single "Waste Your Time" is a charmer, unfurling as a reimagining of '90s alt-pop: Jackson and Sellers' angelic harmonies colliding with quirky, punch-drunk guitar and soft-thunder dynamics that turn into a fury of crashing drums and a raucous guitar solo. © Shelly Ridenour/Qobuz