Lucinda Williams framed the phrase ‘down where the
spirit meets the bone’ in the title of her 2014 album. If you were to discover such a place, Courtney Marie
Andrews would be there scribbling in her notebook before wrapping the words
around her vocal chords. Those cast under the spell of her previous record will
still be locked in a cavern of soulful song-writing bliss as MAY YOUR KINDNESS
REMAIN gets the album handover. It is a case of striking while the creative
iron is hot as the antithesis to romanticised Americana feasts on the
currency of kindness and hope. The intensity and capacity to move runs rapid
across the ten tracks, without the slightest trace of being “overwrought”.
The search for the album’s beacon stops abruptly at the
jaw-dropping momentous ballad ‘Took You
Up’, which has the capability to break each listener with every play. Right from the opening
line ‘is it the journey or the destination’, the instant gift of song writing
nirvana has been found and we are exposed to the starkest of relationship
analysis. From ‘cheap motels, diners and dives’ to ‘wouldn’t trade love for a
million bucks’, the analogies relentlessly flow amidst a stirring soundtrack
awash with gorgeous melodic breaks. This song is up alongside Brandi Carlile’s
‘Sugartooth’ as the best track heard
for ages and is in no danger of removal from a year-shaping list.
Courtney Marie Andrews may have come to prominence with the
release of HONEST LIFE, but there is a lengthy trail of exposure to the world
of a working musician over the last decade. Without doubt, this experience
filters into the song writing process and she certainly has a priceless knack
of capturing her feelings in the sung word. Evidence for the case of removing
iconic namechecking is almost complete to the extent where artists in her tailwind will soon be citing the name Courtney Marie Andrews.
Four tracks have surfaced online in the run up to the album
release headed by the title number ‘May
Your Kindness Remain’. An extraordinary perception to draw positives from
advancing flaws is a trait in the writing process, and this song leads the way.
The most recent album leak was the ironic ‘I’ve
Hurt Worse’, which sees the vocals slightly soar and the fortitude of the
artist spill over. Doubling up on the kindness theme is another previewed piece
‘Kindness of Strangers’. This is probably
one of the fuller sounding tracks on the album, complete with extra additional
backing vocals and an instrumental accompaniment marrying keys, strings and
percussion. Courtney’s lead vocals push a little harder here without losing any
of the sculptured elegance.
My second favourite track on the record is ‘Two Nights in Buffalo’. This was heard
first when featuring in the set at Moseley Folk Festival last September and
made an instant impression. The availability of repeat plays confirms this
initial promise. While every sympathy is offered to the city in question (the
second time it appears in my collection after Amanda Shires’ ‘Detroit or Buffalo’), it is refreshing
for somewhere else other than Cleveland to attract the song writing blues.
Courtney does not refrain from dishing out some near clichés in ‘wrong side of
the tracks’, ‘mom and pop, 5 and dimes’, but the vision painted from this
punchier song portrays the message.
Everything about the infrastructure to this album seems to
fall into place: ten tracks, forty minutes, inspiring lead off title track and
the essential climactic closer. ‘Long Road
Back to You’ unveils as a mini epic in this role. Passion, feeling and a
killer chorus all add to the mix as we get the perfect send off, or hit the
repeat button if you have some sense!
‘Border’ and ‘This House’ were two songs Courtney
presented to a live audience when she played a fabulous solo gig in Oxford
recently. The first of these takes a social look at the immigrant attitude that
blights parts of the States, in this case close to the Arizona home where she
was raised. The second brings the theme back into the realm of the personal vicinity and how sometimes you just have to treasure what you have – warts and
all. This is an aspect of Courtney’s writing in which she really excels.
‘Rough Around the
Edges’ gets the widely used piano intro plus its major accompaniment, and rolls
out as a trademark Courtney Marie Andrews piece. The piercing vocals convey the
passion of the song and demonstrate that soul music can come in many different
forms. It is just an innate trait that certain performers effortlessly pour into
their musical art. ‘Lift the Lonely From
My Heart’ is the final track mentioned, but could quite conceivably be the
first in likeminded reviews. Here, organ and Wurlitzer makes a further soulful
impression and the emotive spark off the album gets a touch fiercer.
MAY YOUR KINDNESS REMAIN is the perfect embodiment of the heartfelt song. It weaves in a thread of art and reality, tearing up the singer-songwriter genre in a similar vein to her iconic American predecessors. Its ability to convey a multitude of messages awash with life’s imperfections tints it with an anti-corporate stance. Delicately sung and immaculately presented, Courtney Marie Andrews is the architect of a record that should act as a country/folk blueprint in 2018. A journey, a journal, a lesson, this album is a classic.
