Looking for a cool singer songwriter record to dull the lack of any real music on the radio? Well, why not try out Kristin Hersh. After all, she’s only been doing this for over 30 years and she knows what she’s doing when it comes to writing and recording. Kicking things off, “LAX” is a good rocker that really begins everything with a bang and allows the listener to easily find their way into this disc. It’s a really great song and one of the more memorable ones I’ve heard all year. Meanwhile, the guitar playing on “No Shade In Shadow” is really strong and dirge-like, a trait I enjoy about the track quite a lot.
“Fox Point” is more of an experiment that doesn’t work as well as it could. It could definitely use more percussion to make it more dynamic. “Lethe” is a pretty interesting song that is worthy of repeats, in order to understand all the gravitas of it.
“Loud Mouth” is another downbeat rocker that really works; the way her vocals and the guitars blend is really something to behold. The same thing goes with “Gin.” This album contains just a bunch of likeable songs with easily hummable music that’s really easy to get into.
The best thing one can say about records like this is: one doesn’t need a bunch of computers and eighteen thousand writers and producers to make a cool pop rock record if they’ve got the talent, then there’s no need for outside influences to mess up the creative process. Simply put, Kristin Hersh is one of the more outstanding singer/songwriters out there, and while this may just be another record in her vast and expansive catalogue, it’s one that needs to be heard in order to understand what real music should sound like, unaffected by any of today’s modern technological aspects.
