“I’m a fan of country music,” declared Mary Gautier at a gig in Melbourne some years ago, “before they fucked it all up”. Gautier’s subjective assessment of the quality of the country music genre was as astute as it was profane: there’s good country, and shit country, and sometimes the turgid dross obscures the brilliant material that led country out of the backblocks of the United States and into mainstream consciousness.
Tracy McNeil has one foot safely planted in good country music; McNeil’s new record, Nobody Ever Leaves, has the other foot firmly swirling around in southern-rock territory and a firm grip on a denim-clad pop sensibility. You can hear it all in the opening track, Wildcats; the subtle elegance of City Lights is Fleetwood Mac without the coked-out self-indulgence. Swinging is the honest singer-songwriter country track for anyone who’s ever pondered the excellence of Lucinda Williams; if Learning to Run found its way onto Nashville radio it’d create a sensation for which Australia sadly doesn’t have the demographic weight.
On Last Place I Looked, McNeil strips back the mood and goes all plaintive and introspective; Sleep In Your Eye slugs back a few glasses of bourbon and rides the resulting wave of Dutch courage with Californian-rock abandon. Luxury Liner is haunting, in a gothic sort of a way; Tooth To a String is the emotional marching song that we’ve worked through in our head, even if we’ve never had the semantic skills to convey it (and check out the Stephen Stills dirty guitar solo for good measure). And finally there’s A Little More Like Love, a touching love song for this, and probably almost any age. If you’re a fan of good music, Nobody Ever Leaves is for you. If you’re not, then you’re on your own.
BY PATRICK EMERY
Best Track: Sleep In Your Eye
If You Like These, You’ll Love This: LUCINDA WILLIAMS, MARY GAUTIER
In A Word: Honest
