Sera Cahoone’s rich, mournful voice, decorates this lush country album, adequately conveying the melancholy inherent in the genre. Recorded in Seattle, home of her label Sub Pop, it sounds more like it was recorded in Nashville with pedal steels, slide dobro’s, banjos and the occasional violin providing the musical sustenance. From rolling Townes Van Zandt style finger-picking rhythms to ambling Crazy Horse style beats, the album flows nicely, alternating between laid back and more laid back. Some nice songs such as Baker Lane, and Runnin’ Your Way give this album the musical hooks needed to give it something to grab onto when listening from start to finish. Shitty Hotel exemplifies the classic country ballad about relationship troubles in desolate landscapes with Sera’s droning harmonica solo adding the final touches to this mood.
The in-sleeve photos show Sera as a gaunt, sunken eyed figure which strangely; exactly matches the picture I had in my mind of her from listening to the voice and lyrics.
Ultimately I found the album pleasant and likeable but was slightly left craving something more in terms of musical twists and turns or lyrical gems or the like. This is an album which could have gone a little further into pushing some boundaries but didn’t.
