lucinda has never been one to shy away from throwing the turmoils of her personal life into her songs, but this might be her most personal work ever. previously those stories were usually populated by the memoirs of failed romances, but this one is haunted by the ghosts of her family life. she lost her father to alzheimers last january. miller williams, a famed poet, was maybe the largest influence on her, both personally and from a songwriting standpoint. she ran all of her lyrics by him before recording them in the early stages of her career, until he finally told her to stop – she had ‘graduated’ (he was also a professor). several of the songs here are either directly or indirectly about him. ‘if there’s a heaven’, ‘if my love could kill’, and ‘dust’, which is actually a poem of his that she set to music. there is also ‘death came’ which was written about her mom, who passed away some time ago, and ‘place in my heart’ which is about her estranged brother.
the title track sets the theme for the whole album – inspired by a recent trip she made to macon, georgia – it is a reflection on a highway in the south where she grew up that tied together the cities her family traveled when she was young. she has said in interviews that she considers this a bookend to the album that first made her famous, ‘car wheels on a gravel road’. ‘louisiana story’ here is similar to ‘bus to baton rouge’ off of her ‘essence’ album.
‘house of earth’ is an adaptation of some woody guthrie lyrics, and she also covers springsteen’s ‘factory’. it closes with a 12 minute ‘faith and grace’, which i originally felt went on 6 minutes too long. but then i heard her explain that the original was 19 minutes long, and was just a jam they caught live in the studio. the drummer used to play for peter tosh, and was there on the day he was shot (also getting shot himself that day as well). so i listen to it a little differently now. bill frisell, the noted jazz guitarist, is featured throughout the album. he does amazing work here, and all the guitar play is worth paying attention to.
at 63, her voice is roughened up by decades on the road, but the emotions come through more clearly than ever. if you are not familiar with her work, i might not suggest starting here, as she is a bit of an acquired taste at this point in her career (‘car wheels’, mentioned above, is a good place to start). but if you are an avid fan like i am, owning pretty much everything she has made, i think this is a must have.
here lucinda gives a summary of every studio album she has ever made, plus more background on the making of this one:
redeyegin 