908. Emmylou Harris - Red Dirt Girl (2000)

Track Listing

1. Pearl
2. Michelangelo
3. I Don't Wanna Talk About It Now
4. Tragedy
5. Red Dirt Girl
6. My Baby Needs a Shepherd
7. Bang the Drum Slowly
8. J'Ai Fait Tout
9. One Big Love
10. Hour of Gold
11. My Antonia
12. Boy From Tupelo

Review

I've been missing some good country on this list lately, and fortunately, in a short space I've had Ryan Adams and Emmylou Harris. The styles are very different but they can both be put under the category of alt-country.

Emmylou is a much older artist with a great career behind her but all of that doesn't make this the album of a has been, in any way. Her voice is clearly more mature, but it is still pretty great. The music has been updated for the 2000's and the whole thing is quite timeless.

The lyrics here are pretty great, interestingly most songs are actually written by Emmylou and this makes her more emotionally engaging in singing her own songs. So another pretty great country album on the list, updated but not forgetting the music's origins, we are fortunately past the stupid innovation of the 80s and 90s, no synths here.

Track Highlights

1. Red Dirt Girl
2. Bang The Drum Slowly
3. I Don;t Want To talk About It Now
4. J'ai Fait Tout

Final Grade

9/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

The album was a significant departure for Harris, as eleven of the twelve tracks were written or co-written by her. She was best known for covering other songwriters' work. Prior to this album, only two of Harris' LPs had more than two of her own compositions (Gliding Bird in 1970, and The Ballad of Sally Rose in 1985). Her next album, Stumble into Grace, was also written by Harris.

Red Dirt Girl: