CD Odyssey Disc 1965: Lera Lynn

This next album review doesn’t have a concert component, but I did see this artist live eleven years ago in Nashville. You can read all about it back at Disc 792.

Disc 1965 is…Resistor

Artist: Lera Lynn

Year of Release: 2016

What’s up with the Cover? Angles and shapes, yo! Also Lera’s disembodied head in a circle.

I’m not sure what this cover is going for, but apart from an exploration of rudimentary geometry, it does not land it.

How I Came To Know It: By 2016 I was already three albums deep with Lera, so this was just me buying her latest release and hoping for the best.

How It Stacks Up: I have seven Lera Lynn albums, which I feel is a lot. Of those, I put “Resistor” in at #4, so right in the middle.

Ratings: 3 stars

“Resistor” finds Lera Lynn doubling down on the same “mood music to be murdered to” kind of vibe that worked for her so well on her 2014 record “The Avenues” as well as her contributions to the second season of “True Detective”. It’s a warm and sultry soak in cigarette smoke and whiskey neat.

Sounds alluring – but it doesn’t come easy. “Resistor” is a headphones album – better when you can immerse yourself in it without distraction. As driving albums go it is a forgettable bit of background hum, but if you give it your full attention without the roar of the engine competing with the low notes and it is instantly so much better.

These songs are lounge personified, and while there is a wall of sound quality to it, Lynn’s vocals have an ability to travel through without ever breaking the broader mood.

The opening track, “Shape Shifter” is a bit of a banger, up tempo and with the snap of a snare drum and syncopation that won’t show itself much for the rest of the record. This song is the one tune that throws its hip into the street and invites you to give the rest of the record a chance. It’s a wise opening choice, but don’t expect more of the same, as the remainder of the record will instead retreat into the deeper swells of sound.

These are songs that take their time, and if you’re in a hurry it is going to irritate you. Lynn’s purpose is not to show you vocal gymnastics, nor to hop from one musical concept to another. She’s here for the slow burn, the late-night confessions that come only after the second bottle of wine gets opened.

Lynn’s early records are much more country in style, and through the mist and mystery of her more urbanized self you can still pick out a western twang, particularly on songs like “For the Last Time” and “Slow Motion Countdown”.

The subtle reverberation of “Slow Motion Countdown” features the many and varied dangers of the night: the rattlesnake in the midnight desert out back, and the distant stare from a lover in the booth across from you, both cold-blooded and dangerous. It’s a song about fading love, but more than that, it is a song about the untethered danger of what comes next.

There are places where the whole thing is so atmospheric it almost collapses under the weight of its own coolness, and not every song has the bones to hold the groove on its own. Just a touch more balance toward that earlier twang would have been welcome, but Lynn won’t go back to simpler times any more than the complex and alluring characters she sings about.

In the end “Resistor” is a slow dance of a record that can go a couple of different ways. Awkward and a bit distant if you are only willing to put your hands on its hips and avoid eye contact; evocative and tactile when you embrace it close against you, and surrender to its perilous charms.

Best tracks: Shape Shifter, Cut + Burn, Run the Night, For the Last Time, Slow Motion Countdown

CD Odyssey Disc 1647: Lera Lynn

I’m a day into a week off work to recharge my batteries. It got off to a lovely start yesterday with some drinks out with friends, and today I’m looking forward to more of the same. In between there’ll be a bit of lunch, a few chores (no day being perfect) and writing this review.

Which brings us back to a little place I like to call right now.

Disc 1647 is…Something More than Love

Artist: Lera Lynn

Year of Release: 2022

What’s up with the Cover?  The ultra-beautiful Lera Lynn looks out through some kind of gauzy curtain. It looks a bit like when you start watching a Netflix show before the high resolution kicks in.

A face like this shouldn't be hidden behind a gauzy current, making the cover a harbinger of what to expect musically. More on that below.

How I Came To Know It: I have been a Lera Lynn fan since first hearing her on the soundtrack from the second season of True Detective back in 2015. This was just me buying her latest release.

How It Stacks Up: I have seven Lera Lynn albums. “Something More than Love” sits at #7. Hey, something has to be last.

Rating: 2 stars

Over the last seven years or so Lera Lynn has been creatively drifting away from me, and while there are moments on “Something More than Love” that flashed for me, overall it felt like another step apart from what I like most in her music. Lynn continues to expand and explore her sound as any good artist should, so there’s no fault to be had. Sometimes people just grow apart. It’s not you, Lera, it’s me.

Lynn has always had a sultry, lounge quality to her particular intersection of pop and country, and on “The Avenues” (Disc 792) and the True Detective Soundtrack (Disc 942) these elements are perfectly mixed. 2020’s “On My Own” (Disc 1453) is another success, although I suspect this is aided by the limitations imposed by the pandemic.

“Something More Than Love” seems to have lost this magic formula. The songs have good bones, and the melodic structures are interesting, reminding me a bit of a throwback to Suzanne Vega’s records from the early nineties. Unfortunately, they are layered with a thick soundscape production that makes everything feel like smooth jazz. It sounded like Sade, who is an artist I have never appreciated, in large part for this reason. Lynn was always Sade-adjacent but previous to this did not cross the line. Now she has.

A good example of this is the annoying drum machine sound on “Eye in the Sky” which, in addition to the irksome production, further disappointed by not being a cover of the awesome Allan Parsons Project song of the same name. Lera would totally kill that cover but alas…no. Maybe on a future record.

There are some winners on the record to be sure. The opening track, “Illusion” makes the ambient production work in a groovy kind of way, like a Leonard Cohen tune off his “The Future” era. This song also brings Lera Lynn’s not-so-secret weapon - her smoky and evocative vocals - to the fore. “Cog in the Machine” also strips things down sufficiently to let the songwriting and vocals take center stage as they should. Washing them down in the mix on so many of the other songs is disappointing.

Lynn continues to have a strong emotional reaction to being a new mother. These are not usually the kind of songs that win me over, but it’s been known to happen. Dori Freeman’s “Like I Do”  demonstrates how to do it right. Lynn’s “You Are Not Your Own” with lines like “I grew a man from my rib/and he walks beside me” should be a great start to a deep exploration of motherhood, but whether it was where the song went lyrically from there, or just that Sade soup of sound, it never hit me the way it clearly wanted to.

Did I give this record the chance it deserved? It is a subtle record, and I admit that I listened to it a lot in the car with the top down (albeit at high volume). However, I also gave it at least one full listen walking around with headphones, which on balance gave it an even opportunity to win me over. I liked it better in that environment but overall the record fell short of what it could have been with a different approach.

Best tracks: Illusion, Cog in the Machine

CD Odyssey Disc 1453: Lera Lynn

I saw this next artist live in concert, back when that was a thing.

Disc 1453 is…. On My Own

Artist: Lera Lynn

Year of Release: 2020

What’s up with the Cover?  Lera Lynn looks like she is about to head out to a Paris café to discuss existential philosophy. I cannot think of very many things I would rather do than have a coffee with Lera Lynn and exchange ideas about Camus and Sartre. I know from personal experience she is a witty conversationalist from when I met her in Nashville. Unfortunately, I find her so damned good looking that when I met her in person, I stumbled over basic grammar and stared at my shoes.  I expect our Parisian coffee date would be a disaster for the same reason, but I’m willing to give it a go and find out.

This copy of the album is hand signed by Lera. When I saw her in Nashville, she signed my copy of her album “The Avenues” in person. This time I paid extra to have her sign the copy I ordered from her. Not nearly as cool, but when it comes to interactions with gorgeous talented singer-songwriters with a possible penchant for chatting about philosophy, you take any interaction you can get.

How I Came To Know It: I have known Lera Lynn dating back to 2015 when she did music for the “True Detective” Season Two soundtrack (reviewed back at Disc 942) but this particular album was just me checking out her latest release. It was not available through Bandcamp or my local record store, so I faced down my e-commerce fears and ordered it direct from Lera herself. It all worked out just fine.

How It Stacks Up: I now have six Lera Lynn albums. Of the six, “On My Own” lands at #3, although it is in an almost dead heat with “Have You Met Lera Lynn?” They are so different it is hard to compare them but the "how it stacks up" section doesn't care for my excuses...

Ratings: 3 stars but almost 4

If you want to record an album where you play virtually all the instruments, then the middle of a pandemic is a good time to make it happen. And thus we are given Lera Lynn’s aptly titled “On My Own”, possibly her loneliest recording experience, but also one of her best.

Those self-imposed limitations help the record considerably. 2016’s “Resistor” is also very pop forward, and at times feels a bit busy as a result, but when you’ve got to learn every part on a song, the tendency is to go with sparse. The effect is to create a stripped-down song that compliments Lera Lynn’s natural talents as a lounge crooner. Her vocals on this record are some of her strongest in years, partly because they are on full display without distraction.

In terms of how she plays all those instruments, I was impressed with the sheer ability to play that many things proficiently. Lynn is already solid on the guitar, and outside her vocals, those bits are the best. She plays bass on all but two songs and it was fine, for as much as I noticed it. The drums are nothing amazing, but hey, she can keep time, and that’s the most important thing. She also wisely lets the percussion provide a funky backdrop, rather than trying to go all Neil Peart on her audience. The choices she makes with the rhythm section are restrained and well chosen.

This is notable on “Dark Horse.” It isn’t a complicated beat, but it is sultry and sets the right tone for the tune. When the guitar comes in, it adds a bit of that old alt country grit. By the end of the song there are backing vocals and even hand claps (all presumably Lynn as well). Despite all these additions the song never feels busy. Lynn has gotten lots of kudos for playing everything, but she deserves even more credit for the great arrangements on the record.

The album opens (wisely) with the up tempo “Are You Listening?” which is as close to anything on the record comes to radio friendly. It has a kind of Annie Lennox solo vibe, and I mean that in a good way. Lynn has a natural groove to her singing and like Lennox can sit down in the pocket without losing any of that sexy smokey barroom vibe.

“Isolation” is also a great track, clearly inspired by pandemic lock downs we’ve all experienced to one degree or another since last March. For all that, my favourite tune on the record is the thoroughly depressing “Make You OK.” Here Lynn channels her own mental distress into a better understanding of a tortured character that she can’t fix, despite a desperate desire to do so. The song could be Lynn’s greatest vocal performance ever, which his saying something.

Lynn’s been sidling up to this indie pop sound for a few years now, but with “On My Own” she has finally nailed it. If the pandemic helped provide inspiration musically and lyrically for her to get to this place, then at least there’s one thing we can be thankful for in these troubled times.

Best tracks: Are You Listening?, What I’m Looking For, Dark Horse, Make You OK, Isolation

CD Odyssey Disc 1396: Lera Lynn

I felt a bit off all day today for some reason. Fortunately, I had Bruins playoff hockey to look forward to…except I didn’t. Instead one of the longest games in NHL history (Columbus and Tampa Bay went into five overtimes) went on for so long that the league eventually postponed my game until tomorrow. Damn.

Disc 1396 is…. Have You Met Lera Lynn?

Artist: Lera Lynn

Year of Release: 2011

What’s up with the Cover? Lera decides to put on eye makeup while driving. I want Lera’s eyes to be as alluring as the next guy, but this just seems unsafe.

How I Came To Know It: I heard Lera Lynn first on the True Detective soundtrack, and then we saw her live in concert in Nashville back in 2015 (see my review at Disc 792 for details). When I was at that show I picked up most of her back catalogue from the merch table.

How It Stacks Up: I have four Lera Lynn albums. Of those four, I would put “Have You Met…” in at number two

Ratings: 3 stars but almost 4

“Have You Met…” is Lera Lynn’s most country album, but even here, early in her career she is already well on her way to sidestepping genres and labels.

The country elements are strong, principally in some of the melodic structures, such as the slow sway of sexy numbers like “Fire & Undertow,” where she puts on her best seventies croon. There’s even the occasional appearance of pedal steel on the record, but there’s a lot more going on besides.

There is also a sultry, soulful sound that would be more at home in a jazz lounge than a county fair. Where she puts the two elements together is where the magic happens. “Bobby Baby” is a dirge about its hard-luck title character. The guitar has that Nashville reverb, but there is something else going on that evokes “The Ballad of Hollis Brown”; an atmospheric menace to the song’s structure that pulls at something deeper.

On “Good-Hearted Man” she stays old-school country with a chorus that evokes Loretta Lynn, but with verses and reverb guitar that lurks in the back alley behind the local rock show. Lynn fully absorbs her character. He isn’t a good person but he’s singularly unable to see that, even as he digs the hole deeper with back-handed justifications like:

“Everybody fucks around
Everybody makes choices that ain’t sound”

Or put another way, “it ain’t me babe – it’s everybody.”

Every song is well served by Lynn’s wonderfully smoke-filled voice. It is breathy, but with a compelling power in her higher register. It isn’t perfect, and there are times when she doesn’t fully enunciate her consonants or curls them in weird ways. At those moments, the spell is broken, but then she climbs into a whispered head voice and wins me right back. When she goes into a falsetto singing of “it slipped by you” on “Happy Ever After” it is like magnetic north to the regret of another bad decision caught in song.

There are other times when the lounge tunes don’t fully draw me in, like on “Paper Anchor” which felt like it took a while getting where it is going, but even on those the emotional intent is there if you let it get into your bones. I always felt that no matter how much sadness and mystery Lera Lynn delivered, there was an even deeper ocean below the one I was currently floating in.

 ynn also does a brilliant cover of Leonard Cohen’s “I Tried To Leave You” which features a big bold guitar, and an almost barroom grit. The mixture of regret and desire is a perfect fit for the album’s originals, and while it would be impossible to like it more than Cohen’s original, it lands pretty much even.

Like my last review, this record was once again short, at just 10 songs and 30 minutes. Just like with THICK, I was still enjoying it after multiple listens, happily diving deeper and deeper into Lynn’s emotional world, and knowing I wasn’t going to find the bottom.

Best tracks: Happy Ever After, Gasoline, Bobby Baby, Good Hearted Man, I Tried to Leave You

CD Odyssey Disc 942: Soundtrack

I meant to write this review last night but after a long and late night at the office I was knackered and opted instead for a couple TV shows and bed. Fortunately, I love this record so an extra day with it was no sacrifice.

Disc 942 is….True Detective Soundtrack

Artist: Various Artists, but a lot of Lera Lynn

Year of Release: 2015

What’s up with the Cover? It looks like the promotional poster for Season Two of True Detective. From left to right we have: a crooked cop, a mobster trying to go legit, an angry cop and a cop with PTSD. It’s not a happy show.

How I Came To Know It: Sheila and I loved the show and the music it featured was always great. By happy accident while looking for someone to see in Nashville, I discovered that Lera Lynn was the mysterious singer in the background of the bar seasons in Season Two. From there it was a simple matter of looking for the soundtrack, which (happily) features music from both seasons.

How It Stacks Up:  I have a lot of soundtracks. I had originally finished reviewing them back at Disc 479, but had forgotten there were a bunch of albums that qualify as soundtracks that I file with the artist that did them. Since I’m now up the 31 soundtracks total, it is probably time to revisit the list. Take a deep breath, because it is long. You’ll note that “True Detective” lands impressively at number four.

1.  The Harder They Come: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 371)
2. Saturday Night Fever: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 392)
3. Hedwig and the Angry Inch: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 225).
4. True Detective: 4 stars (reviewed right here)
5. The Matrix:  4 stars (reviewed at Disc 291)
6. Magnolia:  4 stars (reviewed at Disc 181)
7. Crooklyn:  4 stars (reviewed at Disc 75)
8. Swingers:  4 stars (reviewed at Disc 12)
9. A Kind of Magic: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 749)
10. Flash Gordon: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 659)
11. Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 681)
12. Into the Wild:  3 stars (reviewed at Disc 260)
13. Pulp Fiction:  3 stars (reviewed at Disc 102)
14. Elizabethtown:  3 stars (reviewed at Disc 33)
15. Highway 61:  3 stars (reviewed at Disc 230)
16. O Brother Where Art Thou:  3 stars (reviewed at Disc 386)
17. Buffy The Vampire Slayer:  3 stars (reviewed at Disc 216)
18. Reservoir Dogs:  3 stars (reviewed at Disc 116)
19. Jackie Brown:  3 stars (reviewed at Disc 30)
20. Transamerica:  3 stars (reviewed at Disc 402)
21. Les Miserables:  3 stars (reviewed at Disc 111)
22. Big Night:  2 stars (reviewed at Disc 215)
23. The Warriors:  2 stars (reviewed at Disc 479)
24. James Bond:  2 stars (reviewed at Disc 103)
25. One From the Heart: 2 stars (reviewed at Disc 935)
26. About a Boy:  2 stars (reviewed at Disc 252)
27. Chess:  2 stars (reviewed at Disc 156)
28. Honeymoon in Vegas:  2 stars (reviewed at Disc 17 and then sold)
29. Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat:  1 star (reviewed at Disc 284)
30. Moulin Rouge:  1 star (reviewed at Disc 151)
31. Natural Born Killers:  0 stars (reviewed at Disc 302)

Ratings: 4 stars

Sometimes a soundtrack perfectly captures the feel of the film or show it is meant to accompany. Other times, it is just a great collection of songs. The “True Detective” soundtrack manages to do both.

If you don’t know, “True Detective” is a disturbing crime serial, featuring damaged characters (mostly cops) trying to redeem themselves by stopping criminals even worse. While the first season is superior, both are worth your time and will leave you contemplating the baseness of humanity and the darker secrets of the universe; those secrets that reveal themselves only in fragments, lest they threaten your sanity when encountered whole. Yeah, it’s one of those kinds of shows.

A show like that needs music that sets just the right mood, and famed producer T. Bone Burnett delivers. This soundtrack is actually songs from the first two seasons, shuffled together imperfectly like a deck of cards at a poker table. The shuffling could have taken away from the narrative of the show, but instead the song order creates a new musical narrative that is both evocative of the show, and also casts a spell of its own.

The show manages to find two of the most brooding tracks for each season’s opening credits: the Handsome Family’s “Far From Any Road” (Season 1) and Leonard Cohen’s “Nevermind” (Season 2). The first song is some sort of drug-addled country, with a deep, mysterious vocal and echoes of mariachi bands gone wrong. I don’t know anything else by the Handsome Family, and frankly, this song makes me a bit nervous to delve any deeper. I probably will though.

Cohen’s “Nevermind” has a funky groove and Cohen is at his apocalyptic best as he speaks of all the people who get away with it, whether “it” is love or murder, or some terrible combination of the two.

For all the greatness of these two “title” tracks, the glue that holds this album together is alt-country chanteuse Lera Lynn.

“True Detective” is how I discovered Lera Lynn. Her mournful and lounge-tinged voice sounds like the voice of a ghost here, with T. Bone Burnett turning up the stark echo dial to 11 to maximize the effect of her vocal. Each of her five songs sends a shiver down your spine, leaving you cold and alone with fell thoughts of dark deeds done and the secrets that follow.

Lynn is an accomplished songwriter on her own, and here she teams up with T. Bone and Roseanne Cash. The result is a selection of restless mournful songs that wrap you in loss and regret. On “Lately”, when Lynn sings:

“Lately I'm not feeling like myself

When I look into the glass, I see someone else

I hardly recognize this face I wear

When I stare into her eyes, I see no one there

Lately I'm not feeling like myself”

You can feel the edge of madness creeping in – or is it just grief? The line blurs here as it does throughout the record. Later on “It Only Takes One Shot” she sings of a woman spurned, wrapped in imagery of guns and murder and fell conviction.

As if this record didn’t have enough creepy mood music, we are treated to two longstanding masters: Nick Cave (with Warren Ellis) and Bonnie Prince Billy. Cave and Ellis cover the Gatlin Brothers’ “All the Gold in California” and thoroughly twist it from country anthem to some kind of cultist chant. Bonnie Prince Billy’s “Intentional Injury” is a quiet internalization of the same order.

The record is so good that the Bob Dylan track (“Rocks and Gravel”) is good, but more of an afterthought.

In a way having all these artists contributing their best feels a bit like cheating, and that’s at least one reason I couldn’t give this record a perfect score. It came damn close, though.

Best tracks: All the Lera Lynn tracks (The Only Thing Worth Fighting For, Lately, My Least Favorite Life, A Church in Ruins and It Only Takes One Shot), Nevermind by Leonard Cohen, All the Gold in California by Nick Cave and Warren Ellis, Far From Any Road by The Handsome Family, Intentional Injury by Bonnie Prince Billy.

CD Odyssey Disc 792: Lera Lynn

It has been a busy weekend, starting off with my last day at my old job. I’m taking a one year assignment elsewhere in government and I’m excited to see what the future holds.

For now, let’s look back in the past at the second album in a row that also features a concert review immediately following – this time for the lovely and talented Lera Lynn, who we saw in Nashville last weekend. The usual drill applies – album review first, followed by a review of the show.

Disc 792 is….The Avenues

 Artist: Lera Lynn

Year of Release: 2014

What’s up with the Cover? I think that’s the LA skyline, which is strangely beautiful in a post-apocalyptic kind of way.

How I Came To Know It: I was looking for a cool show to see while Sheila and I were in Nashville and was basically Youtubing every artist playing when we were in town. When I checked out Lera Lynn I was astounded to find she is the singer in the background in the bar scenes of True Detective Season Two. We both love her music, so we bought tickets to see her while we were there.

As for this specific album, I bought her first three albums (and a tour shirt) for $60 while I was at the show. Lera even signed the CD – check it out!

How It Stacks Up: I have three Lera Lynn albums, one of which is an EP. I believe this is all of them, other than the True Detective soundtrack. I haven’t listened to them all yet, but my instinct tells me “The Avenues” is her best, so I’ll put it #1 at this point.

Ratings: 4 stars

Lera Lynn’s music is a complicated blend of haunting indie rock, with strong country and western influences. On “The Avenues” she’s got that blend perfectly.

This is music that will seep down into your bones, and despite the fact that Lynn’s lyrics are insightful and poetic I often found myself drifting with the ambient quality of the music and forgetting she was even singing words at all. Then her sweet and breathy voice would rise up again and catch my attention with a perfectly turned phrase that drew me out of the scenery and back to the plot.

Those plots are often dark, exploring the human condition in all its frailty and uncertainty. Thematically, it is no surprise that Lynn often returns to metaphors that evoke the moon or ocean tides, since this is music that speaks to the quiet spaces in our minds; those subconscious urges and fears that influence us and draw us into decisions despite ourselves.

There are places, notably on “Letters” where she sounds like an early Sarah McLachlan, and it wouldn’t surprise me if that was one of her influences growing up. Her voice has less of a sharp edge at the high end of her register than McLachlan’s, but it isn’t lesser as a result. Rather, it helps fit into the rounded quality of the songs, with plenty of soft reverb, lilting melodies and minor keys.

On many tracks there are small flourishes of country twang, such as the appearance of the banjo and pedal steel in “Out to Sea.” Also, yes – there’s that ocean metaphor again.

On “Refrain” Lynn speeds things up a bit, with a simple three strum guitar riff and a very clever use of empty space. Here she has qualities of Laura Marling, folksy and worldly-wise. The song ends with this sad realization:

“Hold me one last time and tell me that the fault’s not mine

You’re only letting go because I’ve asked you so

Don’t try to realize the forgotten lustre of my eyes

It’s easier if you maintain your cold and hard refrain.”

I love the triple use of refrain here, first as a repeating pattern in a failing relationship, and then as the withholding of affection. And of course, that little three strum guitar riff, hollow and haunting, is the refrain in the song and the musical underpinning to the song.

Songs like “Refrain” make me marvel at Lynn’s talent as a songwriter, and excited to delve into her other albums as soon as possible.

While it is brilliant, “The Avenues” is not an easy album to access. If you expect to throw it on in the car and be singing along by the second verse, you’ll be disappointed. This is an album that needs to sink into you over multiple listens. But true beauty steals into only the quietest of souls. So you do yourself a favour, put aside whatever other diversions you may have and let Lynn cast her siren’s spell on you. You’ll be glad you did.

Best tracks:  Out to Sea, Standing on the Moon, Letters, Refrain, I’m Your Fool, Hooked on You

The Show – Saturday October 17 at 3^rd and Lindsley, Nashville  

After spending the previous night in Nashville down on the soulless gong show of dive bars that is Honky Tonk Row in downtown Nashville, Sheila and I were in need of a positive music experience far from the madding (and drunken) crowd.

Fortunately, before we left on our trip we secured tickets to Lera Lynn, playing at 3^rd and Lindsley. 3^rd and Lindsley is a bar about a 20 minute walk from downtown Nashville, in a desolate kind of industrial area. Sheila and I knew from reading reviews to get there about 90 minutes early to get good seats, and we ended up one table back from the very front, with a perfect unobstructed view.

The opening act was Brian Whelan, who was branching out solo after serving in Dwight Yoakam’s band. The Dwight Yoakam influences were clear, as Whelan played some boogie woogie and generally mixed the blues in with traditional country songs.

Whelan was clearly wishing he had a full band (it was just him and a guitar) but I thought he did a good job of creating the volume of sound his songs required. He had a nice tone to his voice and he played guitar beautifully but the songs themselves didn’t blow me away.

Then it was time for Lera Lynn to take the stage. Lynn has a great stage presence. She’s witty and playful with her audience and had a bit of a potty mouth, which I appreciated (People don’t swear a lot in Nashville, and I was kind of missing it).

She exhorted her audience to come down in front of the stage, which I thought given her slow and introspective songs would be a bit of a challenge. Nevertheless, by halfway through her show she had filled up the empty dance floor with swaying fans.

Lynn played a mix of songs from her earlier career as well as 2-3 from the True Detective soundtrack that is currently boosting her career. Her voice was beautiful and powerful and her band was very talented. When she took lead guitar moments she played exquisitely.

Here’s a fun clip of the band doing an a capella version of the Zombies’ song “The Way I Feel Inside” from the show we were at.

The sound was quite possible the best sound mixing I’ve ever heard in a bar environment. It was loud enough to hear everything but never overpowering or amped to the point of creating feedback. It felt like I was listening to music on my home stereo.

The crowd was a mixed bag. Overall, it was a huge step up from Honky Tonk Row’s drunken frat environment. I was instantly aware that this was where Nashville’s real fans came to get their fix. It was a collection of hip young professionals, university students and older biker/trucker folks. I got the impression there were a lot of locals.

The folks at the large table behind us were annoying, talking through portions of the performance. While they were talking about music, maybe they could have instead listened to the music that was actually playing? See my comment above about how true beauty steals only into the quietest of souls. Fortunately the great sound mixing made it fairly easy to block them out over time.

On the flip side, we met a couple of much more polite guys from Bowling Green, Kentucky. They drove down (it isn’t far from Nashville) and were a couple of avid fans and great guys. When talking to them (before and after the show – not during), we found out that their names were Zach and…Logan! Yes, another Logan. Since he was in his early twenties, I’ve decided to call him LJ.

Anyway – a big hello to Zach and LJ, who made our great Nashville experience even better with some down-home hospitality.

After the show, Lera Lynn was at the merch table to greet her fans – something Lindi Ortega does after her shows as well and may be a Nashville thing (Ortega is Canadian but like Lynn is based out of Nashville).

Also like Ortega, Lera Lynn is ‘stupid pretty’, meaning she is so pretty that she makes you feel stupid just trying to form a sentence when she’s looking at you. Lynn seems aware of her powers and takes a witty and devilish delight in teasing her fans as she talks with them. Yes, I liked it. She seems like a lot of fun and was very gracious in letting us take a picture, and making us feel like it was a rare pleasure, and not something she has to do 50 times a night.

Yes, I wore a Blue Oyster Cult t-shirt to a country bar. Yeehaw!

If you get a chance to see Lera Lynn – take it! She’s got a great stage presence, incredible talent and the days of seeing her in smaller venues may be limited given all the talent she’s got.