Difranco Writes Tunes For Everyday People
Ani DiFranco
“Little Plastic Castle” (Righteous Babe Records)
***
Two songs into her 11th album, Ani DiFranco sings: “All the radios agree with all the TVs, and the magazines agree with all the radios/And I keep hearing that same damn song … People used to make records as in a record of an event/The event of people playing music in a room/Now everything is cross-marketing/It’s about sunglasses or shoes/Or guns or drugs, you choose.”
Well, Ani DiFranco doesn’t make records the way the status quo would like things dictated. The proof is “Little Plastic Castle,” which is all about the connection between the singer and whoever’s listening to her song. In short, this “Castle” is built on an extremely dense batch of songs that document what it feels like to be living in the center of a mediafied world.
And while much will be made of some of the lyrics - which can be read as DiFranco’s struggle with her newfound fame after the success of her last studio album, “Dilate” - the beauty of these 12 songs is that they could have been written by any one of us who has ever felt our relationships, work, lives and very souls being worn down by the rat race that runs every day in North America.
Although some of her instrumentation and imagery feels repetitive, the triumph of this “Castle” is that it is further evidence that there are still artists like DiFranco out there, making music for people, not cross-marketers.
- Jim Walsh
Jim Lauderdale
“Whisper” (BNA) ***
If you’re one of those listeners who pay as much attention to who writes the songs as to who sings them, the name Jim Lauderdale will not be unfamiliar. He’s penned hit tunes for George Strait, Mark Chesnutt, Vince Gill and Patty Loveless, among many others. On this new effort Lauderdale relocates to Music City. Buck Owens’ Bakersfield sound is his most obvious influence, but there also are hints of Johnny Cash, Merle Haggard and George Jones.
No small part of this new sound comes thanks to his co-writers, all of whom are Nashville legends. The disc opens with “Goodbye Song,” one of a pair he wrote with Harlan Howard; he also got assistance from Melba Montgomery (who sang with Jones), Frank Dycus (Dolly Parton and Porter Wagoner), John Scott Sherrill and an old California pal, Buddy Miller.
After about an hour steeped in traditional country sounds, Lauderdale suddenly and pleasingly slips into a bluegrass mood on “I’ll Lead You Home,” a quasi-gospel number featuring Ralph Stanley and the Clinch Mountain Boys, with its reassuring message that there is always a trip back.
- James M. Tarbox