Matraca Berg - Love's Truck Stop [2012] [FLAC]

Artist: Matraca Berg
Release: Love's Truck Stop
Discogs: 4018762
Released: 2012
Label: Proper Records Ltd.
Catalog#: PRPCD107
Format: FLAC / Lossless / Log (100%) / Cue / CD
Country: UK & Europe
Style: Folk, World, & Country,

Tracklisting:

01. Love's Truck Stop
02. Her Name Is Mary
03. Black Ribbons
04. Foolish Flower
05. We're Already Gone
06. I Buried Your Love Alive
07. Magadalene
08. My Heart Will Never Break This Way Again
09. Sad Magnolia
10. Waiting On A Slow Train
11. Fistful Of Roses

'The Dreaming Fields', Matraca Berg’s last album, was awash with wry themes such as the one in ‘Your Husband’s Cheating On Us.’ Berg is a woman who finds common ground in the experiences of so many other females from all walks of life, as well as a dedication to her Tennessee roots. But she also dips intrepidly into solemn waters as the mother/narrator in ‘South of Heaven', a song about the horrors of battle.

By 22 she had already garnered a Grammy nomination and achieved a #1 hit. Now she has returned to the studio with 'Love’s Truck Stop'. The sensitive singer songwriter tells simple, but relatable stories with instrumentation that never overrides the message.

The first song, ‘Love’s Truck Stop’, brings out her brightest vocals. Berg’s style shuffles between a cavalier Rickie Lee Jones and a winsome Trisha Yearwood. ‘Her Name is Mary,’ “with maraschino cherry-colored hair/Has the scripture tattooed on her chest/The one that her grandma loved best,” shows off her innate wit.

You can hear the plaintive black hills in the strum and tearful vocals of ‘Black Ribbons’.

The allegorical ‘Foolish Flower’ speaks to the torment endured by out-of-place souls. ‘We’re Already Gone’ is a tender ballad about bidding farewell: “ Winter’s been hanging around too long.”

The surprisingly bluesy ‘I Buried Your Love Alive’ is understated, but a far cry from the other mostly Americana styled tracks. The austere finger picking of ‘Magdalene’ accompanies a quizzical sentiment. ‘My Heart Will Never Break This Way Again’ is heartbreaking, yet amazingly hopeful.

The heaving blues harp of ‘Sad Magnolia,’ with its stunning lyrics of “Wish you were mine/Underneath the moon of Caroline…”, convey a dreamy spirit, and even when Berg tackles the proverbial travelling song she stamps out a highly charged show on her mournful rendition of ‘Waiting on a Slow Train’.

The closer 'Fistful of Roses' is the one piano-driven cut. With lyrics like “Fistful of roses/Handful of thorns/Chiseled in stone/The day you were born”, Berg solidifies any notion that she’s a natural born storyteller.

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