That rare singer and songwriter from Austin, Texas who was actually born there,
Carson McHone
sounded like the great honky-tonk hope on her early recordings, playing beautifully crafted, barroom-friendly country songs with a splendid voice that added just a hint of welcome texture to her clear, heart-tugging instrument. 2022's
Still Life
, her third LP (and first for the venerable indie label
Merge Records
) takes her gifts and moves them into a different direction without blunting the qualities that made her memorable. While country influences are still audible in these songs, here she embraces roots rock, blues, indie rock, '70s folk rock, and idiosyncratic pop in her melodies as well as her arrangements, and allows scrappy electric guitars to take center stage on several tunes.
Daniel Romano
, the Canadian indie musician who's made several fine albums of his own blending similar ingredients, produced
and anchored the studio band, and his thinking clearly had an impact on this music. But in her vocals as well as her songs,
McHone
takes to this approach like a duck to water, and the energy in her performances on "Someone Else" and the title track sounds gloriously liberating; she's clearly having fun taking her music to new places and the performances are full of the joy of discovery. (Flashes of this album's ambition were audible on 2018's fine
Carousel
.) She also digs into a slow groove on "Only Lovers," evokes the dirty vibe of early-'70s
Rolling Stones
on "Hawks Don't Share," conjures the spirit of
Sandy Denny
on "Folk Song," and is strong enough to lay herself open on the border of emotional defeat on "Tried." All the gifts that made
an artist to watch when she first emerged from the Texas singer/songwriter arena are present and accounted for on
, but she's added new ideas that make this music feel like a metamorphosis; transforming herself into an artist who has thrown off any generic frameworks that confined her in the past. ~ Mark Deming