It’s safe to say that Lori McKenna is something of a Nashville songwriting legend. She’s written hits for pretty much anyone who’s anyone in country music, including Taylor Swift and Chris Stapleton, Miranda Lambert, Maren Morris, George Strait, Sheryl Crow, Carrie Underwood, Faith Hill and Reba McEntire. However, she’s also an artist in her own right, releasing her debut record ‘Paper Wings and Halo’ back in 2000, before her critically acclaimed breakthrough in 2016 with ‘The Bird and the Rifle’. Now she’s back with her 12th studio album, ‘1988’ – the follow-up to 2020’s ‘The Balladeer’ and named for the year she married her husband Gene.
The 10-track project opens with ‘The Old Woman In Me’, which sees McKenna looking back on her life from the perspective of her older self. It’s a bright, shuffling number with a lovely nostalgic quality, cheeky, playful touches – such as ‘kiss [ing her husband] every time a kid walks in’ – and a huge, hopeful chorus. There’s a warmth about it I really love and a slight drawl and brittleness in McKenna’s vocal that adds to the song’s authentic feeling, as well as her trademark storytelling and skill as a lyricist, especially in the final verse as she observes herself ‘sitting on a front porch swing watching her grandkids play’. It feels like a great way to kick off the record and really shows McKenna’s ability to take something so universal and make it feel so personal.
When I spoke to Lori recently about the album, she said she wanted it to have a 90s rock feel, and that shines through throughout the project. ‘Happy Children’, the most recent single release, captures that sound perfectly and makes you want to sway along and put your lighters in the air. McKenna brilliantly pairs that with lyrics packed with sage advice, especially on the anthemic chorus, making it feel like a grungier cousin to ‘Humble and Kind’ (which she wrote for Tim McGraw). Elsewhere, the romantic but measured ‘Days Are Honey’ has a lovely steadfast quality to it as well as a big singalong chorus and punchy bridge and is full of warmth and affection whilst recognising that staying in a relationship takes work (‘take the picture, change the frame, it gets better when you’re looking back on it’).
However, there’s still plenty for fans of McKenna’s previous albums to enjoy her too. Her collaboration with fellow Love Junkies co-writer Hillary Lindsey, ‘Killing Me’, has an uptempo driving feel that belies the darker tones of its lyrics as well as some beautiful Mamas & the Papas-esque harmonies. Meanwhile, the acoustic title track is the most country-sounding song of the bunch as McKenna sings about how ‘those storms made us weatherproof’ as she and her husband dealt with the ups and downs of marriage, the touching ‘The Town In Your Heart’ pairs an Eagles-esque guitar riff and pulsing drumbeat with McKenna urging the song’s subject to ‘keep me in your blood and in your bones’ and ‘Letting People Down’ has a lonesome Western movie feel alongside plaintive vocals as she wrestles with confronting her flaws and not wanting to disappoint those she cares about.
For me one of the highlights of the record is ‘Wonder Drug’. Initially starting with a laid-back feel before moving into a more 70s-sounding, cinematic feel, it’s an intimate portrait of losing a loved one and the impact of mental health issues. There’s a real rawness and sense of regret about McKenna’s delivery as she sings about letting go of a dream (‘how dare you leave me high and dry’), and you can feel her anger under the surface, but the subdued tone makes it carry even more weight and power. On a completely different note, I loved the detail-packed ‘Growing Up’ with its references to Barbie clothes in a Crown Royal bag, Oprah on the big TV and making out in backseats behind Dairy Queen (which pops up again later on ‘The Town In Your Heart’). There’s a bright, joyous, rollicking feel about it before the bittersweet twist in the bridge, and it’s a real testament to McKenna’s ability to create a vivid detail and narrative that it’s so easy to connect to.
McKenna closes the album with ‘The Tunnel’. Once again she immediately immerses you in the song’s setting with references to street names and the ‘smell of summer water’, before talking about ‘the things you learn in middle school but don’t learn in class’ as she looks back on a childhood friend who faced a lot of struggle in life. You really feel the sense of helplessness as McKenna performs the song – she’s so naturally good at bringing those emotions to the surface in her writing – and the huge soaring bridge with its gospel feel saves it from falling too far down into despair.
Overall Lori McKenna has produced a potential album of the year that’s sure to win as much praise and plaudits as her previous efforts, showcasing her phenomenal songwriting talents and skills as a storyteller and musically paying tribute to the women of 90s rock. It’s really exciting to see that different side of her, but also shows she’s still absolutely at the top of her game lyrically, and I cannot wait to see how this feeds into her future projects – whether that’s solo or in her work for other artists. In the meantime, here’s hoping she’ll be able to make it over to the UK sooner rather than later and we’ll get to hear some of these tracks live…
Track listing: 1. The Old Woman In Me 2. Happy Children 3. Killing Me (featuring Hillary Lindsey) 4. Days Are Honey 5. 1988 6. Growing Up 7. Wonder Drug 8. The Town In Your Heart 9. Letting People Down 10. The Tunnel Record label: CN Records/Thirty Tigers Release date: 21st July 2023
